
MARGARET PENROSE 


















































































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DOROTHY WAS AHEAD, LEADING HER HORSE UP THE NARROW 

TRAIL. 


“Dorothy Dale to the Rescue.” 


Page 200 



DOROTHY DALE 
TO THE RESCUE 


BY 

MARGARET PENROSE 

AUTHOR OF “DOROTHY DALE I A GIRL OF TO-DAY,” “DOROTHY DALE 
AND HER CHUMS,” “DOROTHY DALE’S ENGAGEMENT,” 

“THE MOTOR GIRLS SERIES,” ETC. 


ILLUSTRATED 


NEW YORK 

CUPPLES & LEON COMPANY 




BOOKS BY MARGARET PENROSE 

- 

i2mo. Cloth. Illustrated . y 

THE DOROTHY DALE SERIES 

DOROTHY DALE: A GIRL OF TO-DAY ^ 

Dorothy dale at glenwood school 

DOROTHY DALE’S GREAT SECRET 
DOROTHY DALE AND HER CHUMS 
DOROTHY DALE’S QUEER HOLIDAYS 
DOROTHY DALE’S CAMPING DAYS 
DOROTHY DALE’S SCHOOL RIVALS 
DOROTHY DALE IN THE CITY 
^DOROTHY DALE’S PROMISE 
DOROTHY DALE IN THE WEST 
DOROTHY DALE’S STRANGE DISCOVERY 
DOROTHY DALE’S ENGAGEMENT 
vDOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 


THE MOTOR GIRLS SERIES 

THE MOTOR GIRLS 
THE MOTOR GIRLS ON A TOUR 
THE MOTOR GIRLS AT LOOKOUT BEACH 
THE MOTOR GIRLS THROUGH NEW 
ENGLAND 

THE MOTOR GIRLS ON CEDAR LAKE 
THE MOTOR GIRLS ON THE COAST 
THE MOTOR GIRLS ON CRYSTAL BAY 
THE MOTOR GIRLS ON WATERS BLUE 
THE MOTOR GIRLS AT CAMP SURPRISE 
THE MOTOR GIRLS IN THE MOUNTAINS 

Cupples & Leon Co., Publishers, New York 


Copyright, 1924, by 
CUPPLES & LEON COMPANY 


DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 


Printed in the U. S. A. 


JUN19 *24 

©C1A793770 


\vQ I 








~L -r ~ / 


CONTENTS 


it 

CHAPTER PAGE 


I. 

Bad News . . 









i 

II. 

Joe Disappears . 

. 


• 






8 

III. 

Called Home . 

. 








16 

IV. 

On the Trail . 

. 








24 

'V. 

Captured . . . 

. 








32 

VI. 

More Trouble . 

. 





•! 



38 

VII. 

A Letter from Garry 


•I 




;• 


47 

VIII. 

The Search . . 

. 






!•: 


55 

IX. 

In the Tree 

. 








62 

X. 

A Clue . . . 

. 








7 i 

XI. 

Dorothy Reaches 

a Decision 






78 

XII. 

A Guess . . . 









84 

XIII. 

Derailed . . . 

. 








90 

XIV. 

The Warning . 

. 








104 

XV. 

Disappointment 

. 








109 

XVI. 

Dorothy Hopes Again 




•j 




116 

XVII. 

Some Rascals Reappear 







1 33 

XVIII. 

Playing a Part 

. 








134 

XIX. 

An Old Friend . 

. 








140 

XX. 

Real News at Last . 








146 

XXI. 

Two Scoundrels 

♦ 




1.1 




154 

XXII. 

A Surprise . . 

• • 








163 












CONTENTS 


CHAPTER 

XXIII. Gone Again w >, M 
XXIV. A Wasted Bullet . t „ 
XXV. The Storm . 

XXVI. A Gentleman .... 
XXVII. What Was That? m w 
XXVIII. A Voice in the Mountain 
XXIX. The Dastardly Plot . . 

XXX. Captured . , ., ... .. .. 




PAGE 

18S 

194 

202 

209 

215 

221 

229 

237 





DOROTHY DALE 
TO THE RESCUE 


CHAPTER I 

BAD NEWS 

“Everything about the old Bugle office seems 
so changed,” said Dorothy Dale slowly. “I feel 
sort of-” 

“Homesick?” giggled her chum, Tavia 
Travers. 

“Exactly,” retorted Dorothy. “That gorgeous 
big printing press which has taken the place of 
the one we used to have-” 

“The old one-lunger Ralph had charge of?” 
Tavia again interrupted airily. “It was funny, 
wasn’t it?” 

“I think it was a dear,” declared Dorothy 
loyally. “It used to print the old Bugle in pretty 
good shape, anyway.” 

“Good gracious, Doro, any one would think 
you were in mourning for the old Bugle office,” 
cried Tavia, exasperated. “If you want the old 
one-lunger back, I am sure you can get it, pro¬ 
vided it has not gone to adorn an ash heap some¬ 
where.” 




2 


DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 


Dorothy smiled, but her eyes were wistful. 
The two girls had returned to Dalton and were 
now staying at Tavia’s home. They had just 
visited the offices of the Bugle y the paper for¬ 
merly owned by Major Dale and which, for a 
number of years, had been the chief source of 
income of the Dale family. 

The girls were impressed by the great changes 
that had taken place in the newspaper office. A 
fine new printing press had been installed, the 
offices renovated and modernized until all trace 
of the rather dingy and shabby quarters of the 
old Bugle had been lost. 

Small wonder that Dorothy Dale, for whom 
the paper had always held a peculiar fascination, 
felt taken aback by the great change that had 
taken place during her absence. It was like los¬ 
ing an old and dear though shabby friend and 
finding a prosperous but unfamiliar stranger in 
his place. 

“Do you remember that first assignment of my 
journalistic career ?” said Tavia, with a giggle. 
“I thought I was cut out for a star reporter 
that time, for sure.” 

“That was the obituary assignment Ralph 
Willoby gave you, wasn’t it?” returned Dorothy, 
with a reminiscent chuckle. “My gracious, how 
many ages off that time seems, Tavia!” 

“Yes, we are growing old and gray,” agreed 


BAD NEWS 


3 


the flyaway sadly. “I wonder you haven’t taken 
to cap and spectacles long ere this, Doro, my 
dear. I am sure I can see white hairs gleaming 
in the sunlight.” 

“I hope not. I don’t think Garry likes white 
hair,” said Dorothy demurely. 

“Speaking of snowy locks, hasn’t Mr. Grant 
a stunning head of them?” said the irrepressible 
girl. “I simply adore that pepper and salt ef¬ 
fect, don’t you, Doro?” 

“I guess so,” said Dorothy absently. Her 
mind was still busy with the Bugle offices and the 
changes made there. 

“I wish the Major had not sold the Bugle, 
Tavia,” she said wistfully. “I can’t forget how 
I used to help get out the old paper and—I would 
like to do it again.” 

“Good gracious, hear the child!” cried Tavia, 
making big eyes at her chum. “Not hungering 
for a career at this late date, are you, Doro? 
What do you suppose Garry would say to your 
making a reporteress of yourself?” 

Dorothy dimpled and her eyes began to shine 
as they always did at mention of Garry Knapp. 

“I suppose he wouldn’t approve,” she ad¬ 
mitted. “He is just old-fashioned enough to 
think that the man ought to be the only money¬ 
maker in the family.” 

“Well, why not, as long as he can make 


DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 


4 

enough?” demanded Tavia airily. “That is really 
the important thing.” 

“Tavia, how you talk!” Dorothy rebuked her. 
“You know very well you would marry Nat White 
if he lost every cent he had in the world.” 

“Just the same, I hope he doesn’t,” replied 
Tavia, making a face at her more serious friend. 
“I like him very well just the way he is. But 
it will be nice when he gets white hair and whis¬ 
kers like Mr. Grant,” she added pensively. 

Dorothy frowned, then laughed. There was 
no use taking Tavia seriously, and, besides, she 
very rarely meant any of the flippant things she 
said. 

The Mr. Grant whose hair and whiskers Tavia 
so openly admired was the new owner of the 
Bugle and a dignified old gentleman whom Major 
Dale held in great esteem. To hear Tavia re¬ 
fer to him so flippantly rather shocked Dorothy. 
But then, Tavia was Tavia, and there was no 
use trying to change her. 

“I wish the Major had not sold the Bugle ” 
Dorothy repeated, with a sigh. “It seems, some¬ 
how, like turning against an old friend.” 

The two girls walked on in silence through the 
lovely spring sunshine, each busy with her own 
thoughts. They were very happy thoughts, for 
both Dorothy and Tavia had every reason to be 
happy. 


BAD NEWS 


5 


During the past winter the chums had become 
engaged to the “two dearest fellows in the 
world.” Nat White, Dorothy’s cousin and 
Tavia’s “bright particular star,” to use the lat¬ 
ter’s own phrase, was expected in Dalton that 
afternoon. At the thought that Nat might even 
reach her home before Dorothy and herself, 
Tavia quickened her pace, eagerly urging the 
thoughtful Dorothy along with her. 

Garry Knapp, Dorothy’s wild and woolly 
Westerner—again Tavia’s description—had re¬ 
turned to his beloved West to cultivate his land 
and raise the “best wheat crop anywhere near 
Desert City.” Dorothy was fully in sympathy 
with this ambition. The only part of it she did 
not like was the long miles that separated her 
from Garry and Garry from her. It was not 
so very long since she had seen him, yet it seemed 
to her like an interminable space of time. 

“I bet I can guess what you are thinking about,” 
said Tavia, reading Dorothy’s wistful expression. 
“Are you on?” 

“I never bet,” replied Dorothy primly, and 
Tavia hugged her. 

“You blessed Puritan! Just for that I’ll tell 
you, anyway.” 

“You needn’t bother,” said Dorothy hastily, 
for she was sometimes afraid of her friend’s 
intuitions. 


6 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 


“Oh, but I will! You were wishing like all 
possessed that you could be in my shoes for one 
little hour.” 

Dorothy flushed and took refuge in an ad¬ 
monishing: 

“How you do put things, Octavia Travers!” 

“You were thinking that if your darling Garry 
were coming instead of Nat, you would be fox¬ 
trotting madly along this road instead of pur¬ 
suing your course with every evidence of de¬ 
corum,” persisted the outrageous Tavia. “Now 
’fess up. Amn’t I right?” 

“Maybe—all except the fox-trot,” agreed 
Dorothy, with a laugh. “I prefer the waltz 
myself.” 

“Um—dreamy stuff, lights low, soft music,” 
drawled Tavia. “I imagine that would just suit 
you, Doro dear. As for myself, give me jazz 
every time!” 

“When do you expect Nat?” asked Dorothy, 
jolted out of her dreamy abstraction. 

“Right now, any minute. We are liable to 
bump into him at any corner,” replied Tavia 
vigorously. “My goodness, Doro, my heart is 
palpitating frightfully. I wonder if one ever 
dies of such things.” 

“You won’t, that one thing is sure,” said Doro¬ 
thy, looking with admiration at her chum’s 
flushed face and dancing eyes. “Just now you 


BAD NEWS 7 

look like nothing so much as an advertisement 
for health food.” 

“How unromantic,” Tavia reproached her. 
“And just when I was pining gracefully for poor 
Nat, too.” 

“Here he comes now!” cried Dorothy, and 
Tavia whirled around to see a tall figure com¬ 
ing swiftly toward them. Nat waved his hat 
boyishly and broke into a run. He reached them 
just as they turned the corner of the street on 
which Tavia lived. 

“Hello there, coz!” he said, pinching Doro¬ 
thy’s pretty cheek, then turned to Tavia. 

“Not here in the street, you silly boy,” Tavia 
said, as the young man bent over her. “We are 
almost home. Can’t you wait?” 

“Not long!” returned Nat ardently. Then, 
as they slowly approached Tavia’s house, he 
turned to Dorothy, his manner serious. 

“I am afraid I have bad news for you, Dot,” 
he said, reluctantly adding, in response to Doro¬ 
thy’s startled glance: “It’s about Joe.” 


CHAPTER II 


JOE DISAPPEARS 

Dorothy’s face went white and she gripped 
Nat fiercely by the arm. 

“Tell me what it is!” she gasped. “Nat, don’t 
try to keep anything from me I” 

“I couldn’t if I wanted to, Dot, old girl,” 
said her cousin gravely. “That’s why the Major 
wanted me to break the news to you.” 

“Oh, Nat,” wailed Dorothy, “don’t keep me 
waiting! Tell me what you mean! What is the 
matter with Joe?” 

They reached Tavia’s house. Nat pulled the 
two girls down beside him in the porch swing, an 
arm about Tavia and his hand gripping Doro¬ 
thy’s reassuringly. 

“He has disappeared, Dot,” said the young 
fellow gravely. “But you mustn’t-” 

“Disappeared!” cried Dorothy, interrupting 
him. “How could he, Nat? Where would he 
go?” 

“Why, the whole thing is preposterous, Nat!” 
cried Tavia. “A boy like Joe wouldn’t do such 



JOE DISAPPEARS 9 

a thing—in earnest. He must just be playing a 
prank.” 

“A rather serious prank,” replied Nat sob¬ 
erly. “And one I wouldn’t recommend any 
youngster to try.” 

Dorothy felt dazed. That Joe, her young and 
mischievous though dearly beloved brother, 
should disappear! 

“Nat, did he—did he—run away, do you sup¬ 
pose? Was there a quarrel or anything?” 

“Not a thing, as far as I can find out,” re¬ 
turned Nat. Then he paused, but finally added 
slowly, as though he were reluctant to cause his 
cousin any further pain: “But there was a rather 
curious coincidence.” 

“Nat, you are so provoking!” cried Tavia im¬ 
patiently. “Do come to the point! Can’t you 
see Doro is ready to collapse with fright?” 

“There has been a fire in Haskell’s store-” 

“Good gracious, listen to the boy!” cried the 
flyaway scathingly. “As though that could have 
anything to do with Joe!” 

“It may have a good deal to do with Joe; 
or with his disappearance, at any rate,” said 
Nat quietly. Once more Dorothy reached her 
hand out pleadingly toward him. 

“What has this to do with Joe?” she asked 
faintly. 

“We don’t know, Dot. And, of course, it may 



10 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 


not have a thing to do with him. It seemed 
rather an odd coincidence that Joe should disap¬ 
pear on the very day that Haskell’s toy and 
stationery store burned down.” 

“It was the largest store of its kind in North 
Birchlands,” murmured Dorothy, hardly knowing 
what she said. “And you say Joe disappeared 
at about the same time? Oh, Joe, foolish boy, 
where are you now? What have you done?” 

Dorothy buried her face in her hands and 
Tavia rose from her place beside Nat and en¬ 
circled Dorothy in a strangling embrace. 

“Never you mind, Doro Doodlekins,” she 
cried stoutly. “We’ll find that young brother 
of yours or know the reason why!” 

But Dorothy was not to be so easily consoled. 
For years, since the death of her mother, Doro¬ 
thy Dale, young as she was, had taken the place 
of their mother to her two younger brothers, 
Joe and Roger. The boys were good boys, but 
mischievous, and Dorothy had spent many anx¬ 
ious moments over them. 

The adventures of Dorothy, Tavia and their 
friends begin with the first volume of this series, 
entitled “Dorothy Dale: A Girl of To-Day.” At 
that time the Dale family lived in Dalton, a small 
town in New York State. Major Dale owned 
and edited The Dalton Bugle and upon the suc¬ 
cess of this journal depended the welfare of his 


II 


JOE DISAPPEARS 

family. Stricken desperately ill in the midst of 
a campaign to “clean up” Dalton, the existence of 
the Bugle was threatened, as well as the efforts 
of the better element in town to establish pro¬ 
hibition. 

Dorothy, a mere girl at that time, came gal¬ 
lantly to the rescue, getting out the paper when 
her father was unable to do so, and in other 
ways doing much toward saving the day. 

Tavia Travers, her most intimate girl chum 
and as different from Dorothy as night from 
day, had helped and encouraged the latter in 
her great undertaking. Since then the two girls 
had been inseparable. 

Later Major Dale had come into a consider¬ 
able fortune so that he was no longer compelled 
to depend upon the Bugle for his livelihood. As 
a result, the Dale family moved to The Cedars, 
a handsome estate at North Birchlands, where 
already lived the Major’s widowed sister and 
her two sons, Ned and Nat White, both older 
than Dorothy. 

At Glenwood School Dorothy started on a 
different life. Her school adventures were many 
and interesting, and in these Dorothy and Tavia 
never failed to take a leading part. 

In the volume directly preceding this, entitled 
“Dorothy Dale’s Engagement,” Dorothy met ro¬ 
mance in the person of handsome Garry Knapp, 


12 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 


a young Westerner who dreamed of raising 
wheat on his ranch near Desert City. True love 
followed its proverbially rocky course with the 
two young people, but the death of Garry’s Uncle 
Terry and the legacy of a considerable fortune 
left him by the old man magically smoothed the 
path for them. 

Now we find Dorothy again in Dalton with 
Tavia, looking forward to her next meeting with 
Garry Knapp and, despite all her common sense 
and will power, missing him desperately in the 
meantime. 

And to her here had come Nat with this ter¬ 
rifying news about Joe. 

What was she going to do? How was she go¬ 
ing to find her brother? 

She turned to Nat again pleadingly. 

“Tell me all about it, Nat; every little thing. 
Perhaps that will help me think what I should 
do.” 

“I’ve told you all I know about Joe-” 

“But about the fire?” Dorothy interrupted 
him impatiently. “How did it start? What 
made it?” 

“An explosition in the back room, I believe,” 
returned Nat, his usually merry face clouded with 
anxiety. “Nobody seems to know what made 
it, but there is a general impression that there 
was some sort of explosion. People in the neigh- 



13 


JOE DISAPPEARS 

borhood say they heard a loud noise and a few 
moments later saw smoke coming out of the store 
windows.” 

“About time somebody sent in an alarm, I 
should think,” began Tavia, but Nat silenced 
her. 

“You would think somebody sent in an alarm 
if you could have glimpsed the number of en¬ 
gines rushing to the rescue,” he retorted. “I 
don’t think there was a firehouse in North Birch- 
lands, even the smallest and humblest that was 
neglected.” 

“Yet they failed to save the store,” murmured 
Dorothy. 

“It was a fierce fire and by the time the fire¬ 
men turned a working stream on it, the whole 
place was gutted.” 

“Was anybody hurt?” inquired Tavia, and 
Dorothy turned startled eyes on Nat. It was 
the first time she had thought of that possi¬ 
bility. 

“Mr. Haskell was pretty badly burned,” re¬ 
plied Nat reluctantly. “The old codger would 
dodge back into the flames in a crazy attempt 
to save his account books. They were burned 
up, of course, and he came very near following 
in their footsteps.” 

“They haven’t got any, as you know very 
well, Nat White,” said Tavia flippantly, but in* 


i 4 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

stantly her face sobered as she looked at Doro¬ 
thy. Her chum was white and there was a 
strained expression about her mouth that made 
her suddenly look years older. 

“You shouldn’t have told her that about Mr. 
Haskell,” Tavia reproached Nat. “It wasn’t 
necessary to go into all the gruesome details.” 

“She asked me,” Nat defended himself, add¬ 
ing in a more cheerful tone: “Anyway, there 
isn’t anything gruesome about it. Nobody was 
seriously hurt, not even Mr. Haskell. They took 
him to the hospital to dress his burns, and the 
old fellow will probably be up and around as 
chipper as ever in a few days.” 

But Dorothy shook her head. 

“If they took him to the hospital he must be 
pretty seriously hurt,” she said, and Tavia gave 
an impatient flounce in the swing. 

“Good gracious, Doro Doodlekins, there’s no 
use looking on the worst side of the thing!” she 
cried. “Let’s presume that Mr. Haskell is all 
right and that Joe will turn up, right side up 
with care, in a few days.” 

But Dorothy was not listening to her. She 
turned her white face to Nat who was watch¬ 
ing her anxiously. 

“Nat,” she said slowly, “you don’t suppose 
Joe’s disappearance really has anything to do with 
the fire, do you? I mean,” she said quickly as 


i5 


JOE DISAPPEARS 

she saw the frown of quick denial on Nat’s brow, 
“you don’t think that—by accident—he might 
have—you know he always is getting into all 
sorts of scrapes.” 

“It is merely a coincidence, Dot,” repeated 
Nat, hoping that the words sounded more re¬ 
assuring to his cousin than they did to him. He 
knew that they had not when Dorothy caught 
up his words, turning toward him with an angry 
light in her eyes. 

“Then it is a very unfortunate coincidence,” 
she cried. “You know as well as I do, Nat, that 
when a thing like this happens and then some one 
runs away, his name is always connected-” 

“Hush, Doro!” cautioned Tavia, for Dorothy 
had unconsciously raised her voice. “A stranger 
approaches on foot. Methinks he is a messenger 
lad.” 

The “messenger lad” handed Dorothy a yel¬ 
low envelope for which she signed tremulously. 

“A telegram!” she whispered, looking from 
Tavia to Nat. “I—oh, Tavia, I am almost afraid 
to open it!” 


CHAPTER III 


CALLED HOME 

“Let me do it, Doro,” cried Tavia. “It won’t 
do any good for you to sit there trembling like 
a leaf!” 

She held out her hand for the telegram, but 
for answer Dorothy quickly tore open the en¬ 
velope. 

“It is from Ned,” she cried, as Tavia looked 
over her shoulder. “He says Joe has not been 
found and there has been no word from him. 
Oh, I can’t bear it any longer,” she cried des¬ 
perately. “What shall I do?” 

Tavia put an arm about her chum again, but, as 
though the contact had galvanized her to action, 
Dorothy rose swiftly to her feet. 

“I must go home at once,” she cried, turning 
toward the front door. “I will go in and pack 
my bag if you will ’phone for a taxi, Nat.” 

Tavia caught hold of her skirt, holding her 
back. 

“But what good will it do you to go to North 
Birchlands, Doro?” pleaded the latter, unwilling 
to have Dorothy’s visit so rudely interrupted. 

16 


CALLED HOME 


n 

“You can keep in constant touch with North 
Birchlands by telephone and telegraph.” 

“But—don’t you see—I must be there, right 
on the spot!” cried Dorothy, shaking off Tavia’s 
detaining hand. “Please don’t stop me, Tavia. 
I hate to go, but it isn’t my fault. Will you 
tell that taxi man to hurry, Nat?” 

Nat promised, and in a few minutes Dorothy, 
hatted and cloaked and bag in hand, returned 
to the porch, ready to go. What was her sur¬ 
prise then, to find Tavia there before her. And 
Tavia also carried a bag! 

“Wh-where are you going?” stammered Doro¬ 
thy, and Tavia chuckled. 

“With you, you ridiculous Doro,” she said. 
“Do you suppose for a moment I would let you 
go without me?” 

“But your mother-” 

“Oh, Ma will let me do anything I want to,” 
retorted Tavia, with a careless shrug of her shoul¬ 
ders. “She is lying down, so I didn’t even ask 
her. Just left a note pinned to the pincushion. 
When she sees that she will think for sure I 
have eloped.” 

Dorothy hesitated, a tiny frown on her fore¬ 
head. She could never become quite accustomed 
to the queerness of the Travers household. 
Everything in her own home had always been 
so orderly and comfortable and normal. 




18 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 


But with Tavia it was different, had always 
been different, and probably always would be 
different. For Tavia’s mother was extravagant, 
lazy, and often actually untidy. Tavia, left to 
the guidance of her mother, might have had a 
hard time of it. 

But Mr. Travers was different, and though 
he had never made a great success of himself 
financially, he was genial, good-tempered and lov¬ 
able. In fact, Dorothy had often, without wish¬ 
ing to be unfair in the least, attributed Tavia’s 
good traits to her father. 

But now this action of Tavia’s leaving home 
at a moment’s notice to return for an indefinite 
stay at North Birchlands with only a scrawled 
note pinned hastily to a pincushion to announce 
her intention, seemed all wrong. 

“But I want to say good-bye to your mother 
and tell her how sorry I am that I have to cut 
my visit short,” she protested. 

Tavia shot her a laughing glance that was still 
shrewd and far-seeing. 

“She wouldn’t thank you for it, Doro, my 
dear,” she said, with a hint of sadness under¬ 
lying the light words. “Ma never allows any 
one to interrupt her afternoon siesta. Anyway,” 
she added, dismissing the subject as a taxicab 
rolled up to the door, “I left word about you 
in the note—said you left regrets and all that 


CALLED HOME 


19 


sort of thing. Come on, Doro, make it snappy.” 

Dorothy sighed as she handed her grip to Nat 
and slowly followed the flyaway Tavia to the 
cab. There were times when she wished Tavia 
would not use so much slang and always be in 
such a tremendous hurry. It wore on one’s 
nerves occasionally. 

Once in the cab Dorothy sank back in a cor¬ 
ner while Nat and Tavia conversed in low tones. 
She was thinking of Joe and what must be her 
first action upon reaching The Cedars. 

She would go down town, of course, to in¬ 
spect Haskell’s store, or what remained of it. 
She would talk to people in the neighborhood 
and find out if any one had seen Joe in that vi¬ 
cinity at the time of the fire. 

But surely no one could have seen him! Joe 
could have had nothing to do with that catas¬ 
trophe ! Dorothy thrust the horrid thought from 
her mind, only to have it return again with the 
question: Then how explain Joe’s mysterious 
disappearance, and just at that time, too? 

Perhaps the boy had been hurt. Perhaps they 
had taken him to a hospital where they had been 
unable to identify him. 

She spoke this thought aloud, and Nat imme¬ 
diately put her fears to rest, on that score at 
least. 

“The first thing the Major did was to ’phone 


20 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 


the North Birchlands Hospital and two or three 
others in the vicinity,” he said. “They had 
brought in no one remotely answering Joe’s de¬ 
scription.” 

“Then where is he?” cried Dorothy desper¬ 
ately. 

It was just as well that they reached the sta¬ 
tion at that moment and that they were forced 
to run for the train. The hustle and excitement 
served temporarily to divert Dorothy’s mind 
from her trouble. 

Tavia kept up a lively chatter for the major 
part of the train trip to North Birchlands so 
that Dorothy had little time to indulge her un¬ 
happy thoughts. 

It was only when they entered the living room 
of The Cedars and faced the Major and Mrs. 
White that Dorothy felt the full gravity of the 
situation. 

She kissed her Aunt Winnie on the cheek and 
then went over to her father, kneeled down be¬ 
side him and took his hand between her own. 

Tavia’s eyes softened as she took in the tab¬ 
leau, and with a significant gesture she turned 
to Nat. The two left the room and Mrs. White 
softly followed them. Father and daughter were 
left alone. 

“You haven’t heard anything, Daddy?” asked 
Dorothy, anxious eyes upon her father’s face. 


CALLED HOME 


21 


It seemed to her that the Major looked strangely 
old and haggard. 

Major Dale shook his head. He had bright¬ 
ened at sight of his daughter, but at the men¬ 
tion of Joe his face clouded heavily again. 

“I don’t understand it, Dot,” he replied. “Joe 
was always such a straightforward, dependable 
lad, despite the little pranks he was always play¬ 
ing. Wouldn’t be a boy if he didn’t have some 
mischief in him. But a good boy at that—a 

good boy-” His voice trailed off and his eyes 

sought the window restlessly. 

Dorothy became truly alarmed. Her father 
was ill, she could see that—although the Major 
would be the last man to admit such a thing. 
His health had not been robust for some time 
and now the shock of this thing had been too 
much for him. 

With an effort Dorothy pulled herself to¬ 
gether and spoke encouragingly. 

“Of course he’s a good boy, the best in the 
world,” she said. “Wherever he has gone, we 
can be sure it isn’t very far. “We will have him 
back in a day or two. You just watch and see!” 

The Major smiled and rested his hand for a 
moment on Dorothy’s bright hair. 

“I hope so, Dorothy,” he said, adding with 
an unconscious wistfulness that touched Dorothy 
deeply: “Everything seems more hopeful now 



22 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 


that we have you back, my dear. I can’t seem 
to do without my little daughter any more.” 

“You won’t have to do without me ever, Daddy 
dear,” said Dorothy, and there were tears in her 
eyes and in her voice. Then, fearing that she 
had betrayed her anxiety over his changed ap¬ 
pearance, she went on in her ordinary tone: 
“Don’t you think you could snatch a little rest, 
dear? I imagine you haven’t been sleeping very 
well lately.” 

Major Dale stirred impatiently and again his 
restless glance sought the window. 

“I don’t want to sleep,” he said on a querulous 
note that Dorothy had never heard before. “I 
won’t close my eyes again until we have found 
that boy.” 

With a heavy heart Dorothy left the room 
and went in search of Roger, the youngest of the 
family and Joe’s shadow. The two boys were 
almost always together, for Roger worshiped his 
older brother and followed unquestioningly 
wherever he led. 

Roger was in Joe’s abandoned room staring 
moodily out the window, and when he saw Doro¬ 
thy he flung his arms about her neck and wept 
wildly despite a manful effort to control his grief. 

Dorothy patted his small shoulder and waited 
until he shamefacedly wiped away the tears with 
a grubby hand, leaving a track of dirt from the 


CALLED HOME 23s 

corner of one blue eye to the opposite corner of 
his still-tremulous mouth. 

Then she drew the lad down on Joe’s bed and 
gently questioned him. 

“Joe wouldn’t let me go downtown with him 
that last day,” said the little lad, his lip trembling 
as if with an old grievance. “He said he was 
going to meet Jack Popella-” 

“Jack Popella! That boy!” cried Dorothy, 
springing to her feet. “Oh, Roger, are you 
sure?” 



CHAPTER IV 


ON THE TRAIL 

Roger looked chagrined and more than a lit¬ 
tle frightened. The fright was caused by his 
sister’s vehemence, the chagrin because he had 
unwittingly “told on” Joe. In the code of Roger 
no crime was as bad as that of “telling tales” 
on one’s mates. He had spoken before he thought. 
It is so hard for a small boy not to speak be¬ 
fore he thinks! 

But Dorothy was on her feet now, her cheeks 
blazing, and he knew he would have to tell her 
the truth, not keeping back any of the story. 
Roger gave a resigned sigh and braced himself 
to answer questions. But Dorothy asked only 
one of him. That was a reiterated and breath¬ 
less : 

“Roger, are you sure?” 

Roger nodded miserably, and to his surprise 
Dorothy turned suddenly and left the room. 
Roger stared after her wide-eyed. He was still 
miserable, but he was intensely curious as well. 

“I wouldn’t be in Joe’s shoes, not for any¬ 
thing!” he assured himself, as he returned to the 

24 


ON THE TRAIL 


25 

window. “And I suppose he’ll just about murder 
me when he finds out I went and told on him. It 
was his fault, anyway,” he added, in an effort 
at self-justification. “I told him he oughtn’t to 
go with that fresh Popella kid, and so did Doro¬ 
thy. My, but I—I wish Joe would come 
back!” 

Meantime Dorothy rushed upstairs. Meeting 
Tavia outside the door of her room, she brushed 
past her almost rudely. If it had not been so 
late she would have gone downtown immediately. 

The fact that Joe had been with Jack Popella 
on the day of the fire augmented her fears im¬ 
measurably. Popella was a young Italian lad 
with a not very savory reputation, and Dorothy 
had been alarmed when, on several occasions, she 
had seen Joe with him. 

She had tried reasoning with the boy, had 
pointed out the fact that one is very often judged 
by the company one keeps, but Joe had refused 
to take her admonitions seriously. 

“You talk as if I never went with anybody 
else, Dot,” he had said on one of these occasions. 
“And I never have anything to do with him 
except just when I happen to meet him. I can’t 
help saying hello when he talks to me.” 

This argument had silenced Dorothy, and it 
had also almost convinced her that she had nbth- 
ing to fear in that direction. Almost, but not 


26 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 


quite, for Joe still was seen quite often in the com¬ 
pany of Jack Popella. 

To see this lad and question him was Doro¬ 
thy’s one, all-absorbing desire just now. But to 
do this she must wait till the next day, and the 
hours stretched interminably between. 

She flung herself into a chair, her chin cupped 
in her hand, staring moodily at the floor. Tavia 
came in and perched on the edge of the bed and 
regarded her chum curiously. 

“Yes, I am human,” she said at last, in a me¬ 
chanical tone. “I speak, I walk. If you were 
to pinch me I might shriek.” 

Dorothy looked up with a frown. It was the 
first time she had noticed her chum’s presence 
in the room. 

“What are you raving about?” she asked. 

“I was merely trying to call your attention to 
the fact that I am human,” said Tavia patiently. 
“By the way you brushed past me in the hall, 
I assumed that you thought I was a chair, a 
bedstead, or even a humble hatrack.” 

“Never a hatrack, Tavia dear,” replied Doro¬ 
thy, smiling despite herself. “You are far too 
plump and pretty.” 

“I admit the latter but deny the former alle¬ 
gation,” said Tavia calmly. “Why do you think 
I follow the dictates of Lovely Lucy Larriper so 


ON THE TRAIL 


2Z 

faithfully if not for the purpose of keeping my 
figure intact?” 

Dorothy did not answer. She had lapsed into 
her former mood and Tavia regarded her chum 
thoughtfully. Then she deserted the foot of the 
bed for the arm of Dorothy’s chair. 

“Come on, Doro, snap out of it!” she urged. 
“Nothing ever has been gained by surrendering 
to the doleful dumps. Suppose Napoleon had 
been discouraged!” 

“Perhaps he was—at Waterloo,” returned 
Dorothy. But she added quickly in response to 
Tavia’s impatient gesture: “Now don’t you go 
lecturing me, Tavia Travers. I will have the 
doleful dumps or any other kind if I feel like 
it.” 

Tavia felt that her chum was keeping some¬ 
thing to herself, but though she questioned her 
discreetly—and otherwise—she could gain no in¬ 
formation from her other than the fact that she 
expected to go downtown early the following 
morning. 

“Well, buck up, anyway, Doro, and get ready 
for dinner,” Tavia said finally, as Nat’s voice 
was heard below calling to the two girls to “join 
the family in the dining room.” “It won’t help 
Joe any for you to starve yourself to death.” 

“Listen!” cried Dorothy, suddenly jumping to 


28 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

her feet. “Isn’t that Ned talking to Nat? 
Maybe he has news of Joe.” 

Dorothy was out of the room and rushing down 
the stairs before Tavia had time to more than 
blink her eyes. She followed her chum in time to 
see the latter pounce upon Ned with desperate 
eagerness. 

“It isn’t any use, Dot, I’m afraid,” she heard 
Ned say reluctantly. “I have followed up every 
possible clue—there were not very many, at that 
—and none of them seems to lead to Joe. He 
has disappeared as completely as though the earth 
had opened and swallowed him up.” 

They went in to dinner after that, but they 
made very poor business of eating; all except 
Tavia, that is, who never allowed anything to 
interfere with her appetite. 

Once, looking across at the Major, she did stop 
long enough to say in an undertone to Nat: 

“Major Dale looks dreadfully, doesn’t he, 
Nat—like a ghost at a feast?” 

“If you call this a feast,” Nat grumbled. 
“Seems more like a funeral to me.” 

After dinner Dorothy sought out her Aunt 
Winnie and, drawing her into a corner, spoke 
to her about her father. Mrs. White patted 
the girl’s hand gently and sought to evade Doro¬ 
thy’s questions. 

“Your father’s general health seems unim- 


ON THE TRAIL 


2 9 

paired my dear,” she said. “But of course he is 
frightfully worried about Joe.” 

“It is more than worry that makes him act 
as he did at dinner,” persisted Dorothy. “He 
hardly touched a thing. Aunt Winnie, he is on 
the verge of a breakdown, and you know it as 
well as I!” 

“Perhaps I do, my dear,” sighed Mrs. White. 
“But I don’t see what we can do about it.” 

“Except find Joe,” replied Dorothy softly. 
“We must find Joe!” 

Early the next morning Dorothy dressed her¬ 
self in her street things and slipped out of the 
house without awakening Tavia. What she had 
to do she wanted to do alone, and she feared her 
chum’s persistent curiosity. No one should know 
that Joe had been with Jack Popella on the day 
Haskell’s store burned down and the day when 
Joe himself had disappeared if it was possible 
for her to keep the knowledge to herself! 

She did not even stop to have breakfast at 
home, for fear her Aunt Winnie would question 
her concerning her errand downtown. 

Feeling absurdly guilty, she slipped into a small 
restaurant in the downtown district in the vicinity 
of Haskell’s store. She questioned the yawning 
waitress as adroitly as she could about the fire, 
but the woman could give her no particulars 

Mechanically Dorothy gulped down the over- 


3 o DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

fried egg and underdone bacon, thinking longingly 
of home as she did so. How different the morn¬ 
ing meal would be at The Cedars. 

She had started on the second piece of bacon 
when the door opened and—in walked Tavia 
Travers! 

Dorothy gasped and nearly upset the cup of 
coffee at her elbow. She stared at though she 
were seeing a ghost. 

Tavia came straight up to her table, color 
bright and eyes dancing. 

‘‘So you hoped to escape me, fair one?” she 
said, sinking into a chair and motioning to the 
waitress. “You should have known better by 
this time, Doro, my dear. Were you not aware 
that I always sleep with one eye open?” 

“You must have had them both open wide if 
you saw me leave The Cedars this morning,” re¬ 
plied Dorothy crossly. “I didn’t want to have 
even you with me this morning, Tavia.” 

“Business of my becoming horribly offended 
and leaving the place in a huff,” drawled Tavia, 
as she ordered a ham omelet from the indifferent 
waitress. “But I am going to disappoint you, 
Doro darling, for the reason that you will be 
very glad of my company before you get through. 
I intend to befriend you at all costs, even at the 
expense of my honest pride.” 

“Oh, Tavia, you are too ridiculous!” sighed 


ON THE TRAIL 


31 


Dorothy. “I can’t be angry with you, no matter 
how hard I try. Only, if you are coming with me 
you will have to hurry with your breakfast.” 

“Have a heart, Doro. The ravening wolves 
have nothing on me!” 

But under Dorothy’s insistence Tavia finished 
her breakfast in a very short time, and after 
Dorothy had paid the check the two girls left 
the place and turned in the direction of Haskell’s 
store. 

Half way down the block it loomed before 
them, a charred and gutted ruin. Dorothy ut¬ 
tered an exclamation and grasped Tavia’s arm. 

From the wrecked store a skulking figure 
emerged, turned, and, at sight of Dorothy and 
Tavia, darted down the street. 

“Jack Popella!” gasped Dorothy. “What is 
he doing here?” 


CHAPTER V 


CAPTURED 

“Gracious goodness, what ails the child!” 

The exclamation was Tavia’s, for at sight of 
the young Italian Dorothy had left her side with 
startling abruptness. Now as Tavia gaped, 
open-mouthed, she saw Dorothy overtake the boy 
and put out a hand as though to stop him. 

What was her surprise to see Jack Popella 
make another of his quick dodges, evading Doro¬ 
thy’s outstretched hand and dart across the street. 

There were two automobiles approaching from 
opposite directions, but this fact served to stop 
neither Popella nor his pursuer. Tavia screamed, 
for it looked as though both the reckless pnes 
would be instantly killed. 

“Dorothy, stop I Come back! Have you lost 
your mind?” she shrieked, and herself started 
in pursuit. 

The boy had dodged in front of the first auto¬ 
mobile with Dorothy close at his heels. It seemed 
to the excited Tavia as though the car missed her 
chum by a fraction of an inch and she was equally 
32 


CAPTURED 


33 

certain that the second car would not miss her 
at all! 

“Dorothy!” she shrieked again, and without 
thinking of her own danger dashed out into the 
street. 

She fully expected to see Dorothy stretched 
beneath the wheels of the second car. Instead 
she beheld the amazing sight of her chum stand¬ 
ing in the middle of the road breathing heavily, 
but triumphant, her hand gripping the collar of 
the squirming Popella lad. 

Tavia was not sure whether she wanted to 
laugh at the spectacle or burst into tears of re¬ 
lief and reaction. She did neither. Instead, she 
took Dorothy by the arm and led her, still clutch¬ 
ing Popella, back to the safety of the sidewalk. 

“Now maybe you will explain yourself, Doro¬ 
thy Dale,” she gasped. “Do you know you very 
nearly gave me heart failure, flinging yourself 
at those automobiles? Tried your best to get 
killed, didn’t you?” 

“Hush, Tavia! Let’s move on,” said Doro¬ 
thy, looking uneasily about her. “We don’t want 
to attract attention.” And she started down the 
street, dragging with her her unwilling prisoner. 

“Does this go with us?” asked Tavia in a 
stage whisper, indicating the young Italian. “If 
you are so anxious not to attract attention, Doro 


34 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

darling, I might suggest that you set your pris¬ 
oner free.” 

“Not until he answers a few questions!” re¬ 
turned Dorothy. Her eyes were hard and bright 
and her grip tightened on the young Italian’s 
collar as he tried once more to wriggle free. 

“Well, I suppose you know your own business 
best,” sighed Tavia. “But I do wish you 
wouldn’t be so mysterious about it.” 

They had reached a side street and Dorothy 
paused and addressed her scowling captive. 

“If you promise not to run away before I have 
a chance to talk with you, Jack, I’ll let you go,” 
she said. • 

Popella muttered something she took for as¬ 
sent, and Dorothy released her hold upon his 
collar. The youngster hitched his coat up and 
stood sullenly with his eyes upon the ground. 

“A pleasant specimen of the male species,” 
Tavia whispered, but her chum frowned and 
motioned her to be quiet. 

“Why did you run away when you saw us com¬ 
ing this morning?” asked Dorothy quietly. “Why 
should you think we would want to hurt you?” 

Jack Popella glanced up quickly, then down 
at the ground again. Evidently he was surprised 
at her gentle tone and somewhat disarmed by it. 

“I wasn’t scared. I just didn’t want to talk 
to no one.” 


CAPTURED 3g 

“Why?” Dorothy continued her inquisition, 
and the boy shuffled uneasily. 

“Aw, how does a guy know that?” he pro¬ 
tested. “I just didn’t, that’s all.” 

“Now listen, Jack!” Dorothy’s voice altered 
suddenly, became crisp and determined. “I have 
a few questions I want to ask you and I want 
you to answer them truthfully. If you don’t, 
I may be able to get you into a great deal of 
trouble.” 

This kind of talk was more what Jack Popella 
was used to, and he looked at Dorothy again, 
a sullen, unpleasant light smoldering in his eyes. 
Dorothy shuddered to think that her brother Joe 
had ever come in contact with a lad like this. 

“You ain’t got nothin’ on me,” growled the 
Popella lad. “Go ahead and ask your questions. 
I ain’t afraid of you.” 

“Keep a civil tongue in your head, my lad,” 
commanded Tavia sharply. “Or you may find 
you have a good deal to be afraid of.” 

Dorothy made another slight gesture as though 
pleading for silence. 

“You surely haven’t anything to be afraid of 
if you tell me what I want to know,” she said 
patiently, for she had come to the conclusion that 
the best way to handle the sullen lad was by 
kindness, not threats. “Jack, my brother Joe 


36 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

has disappeared and we have no idea where 
to look for him. Can’t you help us?” 

Tavia started and looked sharply at Dorothy. 
So that was what her chum had been keeping 
from her the night before! She had suspected 
Popella and had not wanted her, Tavia, to know 
that Popella was intimate enough with Joe to 
come under suspicion. Poor Doro, she certainly 
had her hands full of trouble! 

As for the young Italian, at the mention of 
Joe’s name his behavior became very strange in¬ 
deed. He squirmed and once more glanced up 
and down the block as though contemplating 
escape. 

Dorothy took a step or two closer and he evi¬ 
dently changed his mind. He shuffled to the other 
foot and said, without raising his eyes: 

“I don’t know nothin’ about Joe, honest I 
don’t, Miss Dale. If he’s disappeared I’m sure 
sorry, but I don’t know nothin’ about him.” 

For a moment Dorothy was nonplused. The 
Italian’s protestations seemed sincere enough, and 
yet- 

“Don’t believe him,” whispered Tavia in her 
ear. “He has a shuffling foot and a shifty eye. 
A wicked combination—take it from one who 
knows!” 

Dorothy had an absurd desire to giggle, but 
Tavia’s words had been enough to turn uncer- 




THE BOY DODGED IN FRONT OF THE AUTOMOBILE WITH DOROTHY 

AT HIS HEELS. 

“Dorothy Dale to the Rescue.” Page 32 










CAPTURED 


37 

tainty into active distrust. Still she held herself 
in check, not speaking with the severity she 
thought the unpleasant lad deserved. 

“I have reason to know you were with Joe 
on the morning that Haskell’s store burned 
down,” she said, and Tavia gave a surprised 
exclamation which, while instantly stifled, caused 
the swift rush of color to Dorothy’s face. 

“Aw, who tol’ you that? It ain’t so!” mut¬ 
tered Popella. 

With these words something seemed to snap 
in Dorothy’s brain. Her horrible anxiety of the 
past few hours fanned the indignation she felt 
against this lad. She reached out and gripped 
him fiercely by the shoulders. 

“It is so, and you know it,” she said in a tone 
that terrified the cowardly boy. “And if you 
don’t tell me the truth now, Jack Popella, I will 
turn you over to some one who will make you. 
Maybe they will be able to find out then, who 
really set Jud Haskell’s store on fire!” 

It was a chance shot, but it went home. Popella 
writhed and wriggled in Dorothy’s grip, sputter¬ 
ing and protesting. 

“I didn’t set his store on fire, I tell you!” he 
cried. “It was Joe that did it!” 


/ 


CHAPTER VI 

MORE TROUBLE 

Dorothy started back as though Jack Popella 
had struck her. 

It was not true! It could not be true! Joe 
never, never would do such a thing! Her face 
turned very white and she trembled violently. 
Even Jack Popella seemed alarmed at what he 
had done and stood regarding her with a strange 
mixture of bravado and sheepishness. 

Tavia, sprang forward, putting her arm about 
Dorothy and fixing blazing eyes upon the young 
Italian. 

“How dare you say such a thing!” she gasped. 
“You know it is a horrible, an awful-” 

But Dorothy rallied and pressed a hand close 
upon Tavia’s lips. 

“Don’t, dear,” she pleaded faintly. “I am 
not quite through with him yet. Jack Popella,” 
she turned to the swarthy lad and her tone was 
strangely quiet and subdued, “tell me all you 
know. Won’t you, please ?” 

“I don’t know nothin’ much,” protested the 
Italian, abashed and sullen again. “I know that 
38 



MORE TROUBLE 


39 

Joe set fire to the store and when the explosion 
came he got scared and run away. That’s all.” 

“Enough to scare anbody, I should say,” mur¬ 
mured Tavia, but Dorothy took no notice of 
her. 

“Why should Joe do a thing like that?” asked 
Dorothy, still in that strangely gentle tone. “He 
never was a bad boy, Jack. He must have had 
some reason.” 

Popella was silent, but again his glance darted 
up and down the block as though seeking escape. 

“Won’t you tell me what reason Joe had for 
doing such a thing—if he did it?” Dorothy per¬ 
sisted, repeating: “He must have had some 
reason.” 

“Aw, I dunno,” returned the lad uneasily. “He 
had a fight with ole man Haskell, that’s all.” 

“What about?” asked Dorothy patiently. 
“You must know what it was about, Jack.” 

“The ole man short-changed him, if you want 
to know,” the lad burst out as though her per¬ 
sistence irritated him past bearing. “We was 
buyin’ some toys with a two-dollar bill Joe had 
an’ the ole man wouldn’t give him the right 
change. Joe tole him about it an’ the ole man 
got mad. Then Jot got mad an’ they had a 
reg’lar fight.” 

“Must have been an unequal struggle,” mur- 


40 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

mured Tavia. “I imagine Joe got the worst of 
it.” 

“Aw, it wasn’t that kind of a scrap,” retorted 
the Italian lad, favoring Tavia with a pitying 
glance that caused her to choke and search fran¬ 
tically for her handkerchief. “Joe knows better 
than to pitch into a big feller like ole man Haskell. 
They just yelled at each other, that’s all.” 

“And Joe set fire to a store because of a little 
thing like that!” said Dorothy, in a dazed tone, 
as though she were repeating something she had 
heard in a dream. “I don’t believe it!” 

“Believe it or not, lady,” retorted Jack Pop- 
ella, with a return of his insolent air now that 
suspicion had been shifted from him. “It’s the 
trut’. So long!” And with another of his eel¬ 
like movements he dodged past Dorothy and dis¬ 
appeared around the corner. 

Dorothy watched him go apathetically. What 
did it matter to her what happened to Jack Pop- 
ella now? 

“The slimy little toad!” cried Tavia, disgust¬ 
edly. “Ugh! I should thing you would want 
to wash your hands, Doro. They must feel 
greasy.” 

“They don’t feel at all,” admitted Dorothy 
wearily. “Just now I don’t believe there is a bit 
of sensation in any part of me, Tavia.” 

“Poor little Doro!” said Tavia gently. “Hav- 


MORE TROUBLE 


4i 


ing a pretty hard time of it, aren’t you, honey? 
But of course you don’t believe a word that little 
toad told you?” 

Dorothy was silent and Tavia looked at her 
sharply, 

“You don’t, do you?” she repeated, with in¬ 
creased emphasis. 

“Oh, I am trying hard not to, Tavia,” cried 
Dorothy desperately. “But there—there is the 
circumstantial evidence.” 

“Circumstantial evidence—pah!” cried Tavia 
vehemently. “Any real criminal lawyer will tell 
you it isn’t worth powder to blow it up with. 
Proof, that’s the thing! And what proof have 
you? Not a bit. Only the word of that slimy 
little toad—who, by the way, will bear consid¬ 
erable watching, if you will listen to me,” she 
added significantly. 

“But Jack Popella didn’t run away and Joe 
did!” Dorothy pointed out to her miserably. 

“Oh-ho, so that’s what’s worrying you! Well, 
I wouldn’t let it, if I were you. Don’t you know 
that the smartest criminals believe that the safest 
place in the world for them is right in the vi¬ 
cinity of their crime?” 

“Good gracious, Tavia, I wish you wouldn’t 
speak of criminals so much,” interrupted Dorothy 
unhappily. “It makes me feel uncomfortable.” 

Tavia wanted to laugh but, after a glance at 


42 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

Dorothy’s face, forbore. There were times when 
the careless Tavia could be very tactful, especially 
with the people she loved. 

They returned to The Cedars to find Mrs. 
White considerably worried over their unex¬ 
plained absence. But when Dorothy explained 
where she had been and what she had found 
out Mrs. White readily forgave her. She was 
as alarmed and distressed as Dorothy over the 
revelations of young Jack Popella and she agreed 
with rather significant readiness that at present 
nothing should be said to the Major concerning 
this new turn in events. 

“Where is Dad?” asked Dorothy, as she turned 
to go unstairs. Mrs. White looked still further 
distressed. 

“You must not be alarmed, Dorothy dear,” 
she said. “But your father preferred to stay 
in bed this morning-” 

“In bed!” Dorothy interrupted swiftly. “Then 
he is ill!” 

“He says he is just tired, dear. And, indeed, 
he has not slept for several nights,” the Major’s 
sister explained, adding, as Dorothy once more 
turned to leave the room: “He has been asking 
for you.” 

“Asking for you, asking for you,” hammered 
in Dorothy’s head as she ran up the stairs to 



MORE TROUBLE 


43 


see for herself why it was the Major had “pre¬ 
ferred to stay in bed.” 

At the top of the stairs she ran into Ned, who 
caught her arm and held on to it, laughingly. 

“Whither away so fast, fair cousin?” he que¬ 
ried. “You should never rush like that so soon 
after breakfast. Any doctor’s book will tell you 
as much.” 

“Let me go, Ned,” Dorothy pleaded. “Dad 
is ill.” 

“Not ill—just tired,” corrected Ned, the while 
Dorothy wondered at his denseness. “No won¬ 
der,” he added grumblingly. “I would be tired 
too, in his place. That young brother of yours 
needs a sound thrashing, Dot.” 

“Ned, how dare you say such a thing!” Doro¬ 
thy turned upon him with flashing eyes. “Poor 
Joe needs his family just now—and that’s all 
he needs.” 

She was gone before her cousin could speak, 
and Ned was left to whistle his surprise and ad¬ 
miration. 

“Poor, loyal kid,” he muttered, as he went on 
down the stairs. “Has a lot on her mind, too. 
Guess Nat and I had better get busy if we don’t 
want to lose our reputations as rivals of the great 
detectives.” 

Meantime Dorothy had rapped upon her 


44 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

father’s door and, receiving no answer, pushed 
it gently open. 

So still and quiet was the Major’s face upon 
the pillow that she thought for a moment he was 
asleep. But as she turned to creep silently away 
he opened his eyes and called to her. 

“I have been waiting to see you, daughter,” 
he said, and again Dorothy detected that unusual 
wistfulness in his tone. “Where have you been?” 

Dorothy evaded the question, feeling miserable 
as she did so. Never before had she refused 
to answer any query put to her by the Major 
and now it was almost impossible not to give him 
a straightforward reply. Yet how could she 
tell him, in his weakened condition, that Joe was 
suspected of having set fire to Haskell’s store? 

Instead, she gave some explanation of her ab¬ 
sence that seemed to satisfy him well enough. 
When she came and knelt beside his bed he spoke 
in his old cheerful vein of his indisposition, in¬ 
sisting that it was sheer laziness on his part and 
that he would surely be downstairs for luncheon. 

But Dorothy, looking at his worn and weary 
face, was not so optimistic. Although she suc¬ 
ceeded in hiding her anxiety beneath her usual 
practical and cheerful manner, she was inwardly 
deciding to call up the family physician as soon 
as she left her father’s room. 


MORE TROUBLE 


45 

She knew that when the Major kept his bed 
there was something seriously wrong with him. 

A few moments later, carefully muffling her 
voice so that her father might not hear her, 
Dorothy called up the doctor and was told that 
the physician would call at The Cedars as soon 
as possible, probably about eleven o’clock. 

She went down to the living room and found 
Tavia and Nat quite evidently absorbed in each 
other’s company. She was about to retreat and 
leave them to themselves when Tavia spied her 
and called out merrily. 

“No reserved seats in here,” she told Dorothy 
gravely, as the latter slowly returned and sank 
down into one of the big, comfortable chairs. 
“Everbody invited, free of charge. Why the 
long face, Doro darling? Any new and dreadful 
thing happened?” 

“I have called Doctor Paugh to see Dad,” 
returned Dorothy wearily. “He will be here soon, 
I think.” 

“Why, Doro, is it as bad as that?” asked 
Tavia, with quick sympathy. “I had no idea 
he was really ill.” 

“Have you ever known the Major to stay in 
bed when he didn’t have to?” retorted Dorothy, 
and something in her tone and manner convinced 
both Tavia and Nat that there was more to the 
Major’s indisposition than they had imagined. 


46 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

They were silent for a few moments, then Nat 
spoke softly to Dorothy. 

“Tavia has just been telling me what you 
found out from Jack Popella.” 

Dorothy glanced up and Nat added quickly: 

“You can’t put too much stock in what that 
fellow tells you, Dot. His word would be the 
last I’d trust.” 

“I don’t know what to trust,” confessed Doro¬ 
thy miserably. “Or which way to turn-” 

“Which reminds me,” interrupted Tavia with 
apparent irrelevance, “that a letter came for you 
from the wild and woolly West a few moments 
ago, Doro. I have a sneaking notion it’s from 
Garry.” 




CHAPTER VII 


A LETTER FROM GARRY 

“Good gracious, why didn’t you tell me that 
hours ago?” cried Dorothy, rising with an alacrity 
that made Tavia and Nat exchange amused and 
sympathetic glances. “I haven’t had a letter from 
Garry since-” 

“Yesterday!” finished Tavia with fine irony, 
and the corners of Dorothy’s mouth dimpled in 
a brief smile. 

“The day before !” she corrected demurely. “I 
was beginning to worry.” 

She fetched the letter, a bulky, satisfactory- 
looking epistle from the table in the hall and 
returned to the living room to read it in com¬ 
fort. 

“I needn’t ask you to excuse me while I ex¬ 
amine my mail,” she remarked to the absorbed 
couple in the window seat. “You are only too 
glad!” 

“My, isn’t she the mean thing!” cried Tavia, 
not in the least abashed. “Just wait till Garry 
Knapp comes East again, Doro. Make believe 
I won’t get even!” 


47 



48 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

“When Garry comes East again you won’t 
have any chance to get even with Dot, my dear 
Tavia,” laughed Nat. “She won’t even know 
that you and I exist.” 

“She doesn’t know it now,” retorted Tavia, 
with a meaning glance at her chum who was com¬ 
pletely absorbed in Garry’s letter. 

“Well, can you blame her?” Nat’s voice had 
softened until it reached only Tavia’s ears. “She’s 
got what we have and—it’s a pretty good thing 
to have, isn’t it, girl?” 

“Nat, I never knew I was living before,” con¬ 
fessed Tavia softly, and after that it was very 
lucky for them that Dorothy was too absorbed 
in her letter to notice them! 

Garry was well. So much Dorothy learned 
from the letter, written in his usually cheery 
vein. But, though he actually said little about it 
in words, Dorothy could read between the lines 
well enough to see that something was worrying 
him. He spoke lightly in one place of the “gang” 
that was trying to “get fresh” with him and “put 
a spoke in his wheel.” 

Although he spoke lightly of the whole affair, 
Dorothy sensed the fact that he was worried 
and was correspondingly anxious. If she could 
only see Garry for a few moments she would 
worm the whole thing out of him—for she knew 
how 


A LETTER FROM GARRY 


49 

If she could only see him for a few moments! 
The thought and wish formed itself in her mind 
and became a longing so acute that it was almost 
pain. 

To see Garry, just for a little while. To lean 
upon his strength, to ask his advice and follow 
it. She knew she could do that without question. 
Garry’s advice was always sound. 

To have him with her! And she could ef¬ 
fect this desired result by a mere gesture! There 
was something thrilling in that thought. A tele¬ 
gram to far-off Desert City and Garry would 
be at her side as soon as trains could get him 
there. 

It was a tempting vision but, as she knew, a 
selfish one. 

Garry was having his hands full attending to 
his own affairs. Why should she trouble him 
with her worries? 

And, besides, this mysterious “gang” of which 
he spoke so lightly would undoubtedly take ad¬ 
vantage of his absence from the ranch to “get 
fresh” in earnest. 

No, she must not ask his aid—not just now. 

At the thought she sighed and it was such a 
deep and hearty sigh that the irrepressible Tavia 
giggled. 

Dorothy started and half rose from her chair 
in dismay, so completely had she forgotten the 


50 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

presence of Tavia and Nat in the room. Meet¬ 
ing the laughing gaze of the two in the window 
seat she relaxed again, smiling a bit sheepishly, 
and gathered up the various pages of her letter. 

“Was it so dreadfully sad, Doro?” teased 
Tavia. “Dare you to read me the last page?” 

“That isn’t a fair dare and not a bit sporting 
of you, Tavia Travers,” retorted Dorothy, with 
mock primness. “Dare me something within the 
bounds of possibility and I may take you up!” 

“Is he coming on soon?” Tavia persisted, and 
Dorothy slowly shook her head. 

“He is very busy on the ranch,” she said, add¬ 
ing with an unsteady little laugh: “I guess any 
one who wants to see Garry in the near future 
will have to go out West.” 

How little did she know that these words, 
spoken carelessly enough, were to prove pro¬ 
phetic ! 

The doctor came as he had promised at eleven 
o’clock and, after a thorough examination of the 
Major, talked gravely and seriously to Mrs. 
White and Dorothy. 

“His heart is not in as good condition as I 
should like to see it,” he told them. “He has 
not been in vigorous health for some time, as 
you know. And now the best medicine I can rec¬ 
ommend—besides a tonic, for which I will leave 


A LETTER FROM GARRY 


5i 

you a prescription—is absolute rest and quiet and 
a mind free from worry.” 

He noticed the quick look that passed between 
Dorothy and Mrs. White at these last words 
and his eyes seemed to be boring into the former 
as he asked quietly: “Has Major Dale been 
subjected to a severe shock during the last two 
or three days?” 

As simply as possible Dorothy told him the 
facts about Joe. The physician listened with 
every evidence of sympathy and concern. 

“Too bad, too bad!” he murmured at last. 
“There is no way, I suppose, that word of his 
father’s condition might be sent to the lad?” 

“No, doctor,” answered Dorothy despair¬ 
ingly. “We have not the slightest idea where 
Joe is!” 

The physician nodded soberly and rose to go, 
leaving behind him a final admonition that, as 
far as it was possible, the Major’s mind was to 
be kept free of worry. 

“And he might just as well ask us,” remarked 
Dorothy, as from an upstairs window they 
watched the doctor drive away, “to give him the 
moon!” 

Mrs. White came and put her arms about 
Dorothy, and the girl put her head down on 
her aunt’s shoulder and wept a little. 

“It all seems so strange and upside down and 


$2 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

tragic, Aunt Winnie,” she said, after a minute, 
wiping her eyes on a small square of handker¬ 
chief. “Always before when anything dreadful 
like this happened, I have had some idea what 
I ought to do, but now I am all at sea. Don’t 
you think,” she added, holding her aunt off from 
her and looking at her seriously, “that we ought 
to notify the police, set a detective on his trail, 
or something?” 

Mrs. White looked thoughtful for a moment, 
but she finally shook her head. 

“That would be publishing to the world Joe’s 
connection—if there is one—with the Haskell 
store fire,” she said. “And, for Joe’s sake, that 
is the last thing any of us wants to happen.” 

“But meantime something dreadful may hap¬ 
pen to the boy—he is only a boy, after all, Aunt 
Winnie,” wailed Dorothy. “He may be in dan- 


“He hasn’t met with any accident, we are sure 
of that,” Mrs. White interrupted reassuringly. 
“And if he has run away, thinking that he might 
be connected in some way with the fire, he will 
return when he thinks the alarm has died down.” 

“But in the meantime he may be in danger,” 
reiterated Dorothy. “It seems dreadful to have 
a boy of Joe’s age roaming around the world 
alone and unprotected. Aunt Winnie, we must 
do something. We must!” 



A LETTER FROM GARRY 


53 


“We are doing something, dear,” Mrs. White 
reminded her soothingly. “Ned and Nat are 
leaving no stone unturned to discover the where¬ 
abouts of the lad and they are not going to stop 
hunting until they find him. And now go back 
to your father, my dear,” she added. “You 
seem to be the only one who can content him 
just now.” 

“No one knows what may happen to Daddy if 
we don’t find Joe soon!” muttered Dorothy, as 
she turned to leave the room. 

It seemed that Dorothy Dale had her full 
share of trouble just then but, as it happened, 
fate had still a little more in store for her. And, 
indeed, it would probably have been the straw 
too much if Tavia, with her native tact, had 
not kept the worry from her. 

For Roger, the youngest of the family, had 
felt Joe’s disappearance more keenly perhaps than 
any of the others, because he had less philosophy 
to bear his sorrows. 

And since his admission to Dorothy that his 
brother had been in the company of Jack Popella 
on the day of the fire, his conscience had troubled 
him rather badly and his one thought was to get 
Joe and beg his pardon for his perfidy before 
some one else could tell him of it. 

With this thought in mind, Roger started out 
bravely and manfully to find his older brother. 


54 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

He left the house early in the afternoon, pre¬ 
sumably to play with some of the neighborhood 
children, and his prolonged absence was not re¬ 
marked till nearly dinner time. 

Then it was Tavia who, looking up the boy 
for the purpose of herself asking him some ques¬ 
tion concerning Joe, learned that he had been 
absent for several hours. 

“I may be an idiot to worry,” she said, tak¬ 
ing her suspicions to Nat, “but I do think that 
we ought to set out on the trail of that youngster 
and bring him back before Doro has a chance 
to discover his absence. What do you think?” 

“That you are right, as usual,” returned Nat, 
with a fond glance at the pretty Tavia. “We’ll 
be back in jig time with that young cousin of 
mine by the collar.” 


CHAPTER VIII 


THE SEARCH 

Nat and Tavia got out the old Fire Bird ma¬ 
chine that had seen them through many adven¬ 
tures in order to cover the ground with “full 
speed ahead,” to use Nat’s own phrase. 

“Something tells me our young wanderer may 
have strayed far afield,” remarked Nat, as he 
manipulated things in preparation for the start. 
“We shall need all the gas and ingenuity we have 
if we are to return the kidlet before Dot dis¬ 
covers his absence.” 

“He may only be playing in perfectly harm¬ 
less fashion with his mates,” remarked Tavia, 
as she gloried in the sting of the wind against her 
face. “I probably am just scaring up trouble.” 

“I hope so!” said Nat dubiously, and Tavia 
looked at him quickly. 

“But you think not!” she said. “Am I right?” 

“As always!” He smiled and then added 
gravely: “Roger is an obedient lad, you know, 
and he has been told always to be in the house by 
five o’clock. The fact that it is now approaching 
six and Roger still at large seems ominous to me.” 

55 


5 6 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

“Nat, do you think—” began Tavia slowly, 
“do you think that Roger may have gone to find 
Joe?” 

“That’s just what he would be apt to do, good 
little sport that he is,” said Nat, troubled eyes on 
the road ahead. “Poor Dot! I hate to think 
how she will feel if we fail to bring back the 
bacon, in the shape of my young cousin.” 

“Where are you going, Nat dear?” asked Ta¬ 
via, after a moment of silence. “You seem to 
have some definite objective.” 

“I have,” declared Nat, as he slowed down 
before an imposing white house. “I am going to 
visit the home of every kid in the neighborhood 
that Roger plays with. Then, if I fail to gain 
a clue, I haven’t the faintest idea what to do next.” 

“Never give up till you try,” urged Tavia. 
“Hurry, Nat—do! I feel as though I were on 
pins and needles.” 

“Not very comfortable,” returned Nat, grin¬ 
ning, as he swung his long legs over the car door 
without bothering to open it. 

Tavia watched him swing up the drive, ring 
the bell of the imposing white house, and, a mo¬ 
ment later, hold converse with the owner of it. 
She knew by the manner in which he came back to 
her that the interview had been disappointing. 

“Nothing doing,” he said in response to her 
tacit question. “The lady of the house, backed 


THE SEARCH 


57 

by the kid in there, says they haven’t seen our 
youngster to-day.” 

“The plot thickens,” murmured Tavia. “Poor 
Doro. What shall we tell her?” 

“Hold your horses, young lady,” Nat advised 
her. “We have several other places to visit be¬ 
fore we begin to give up hope. We’ll find him 
yet.” 

Although they made a thorough canvass of all 
the homes in the neighborhood which contained 
familiars, or possible familiars, of the missing 
Roger, their quest was unsuccessful. No one 
seemed to have seen the missing youngster that 
day, and Nat and Tavia were forced to admit 
that, so far, their mission had failed. 

“You are not going to give up yet, Nat?” cried 
Tavia quickly, as Nat started to turn the nose of 
the Fire Bird toward home. “Why, we have not 
even begun to look!” 

Nat shut off the power and regarded his com¬ 
panion in perplexity. 

“It seems to me we have made not only a be¬ 
ginning, but an ending, as well,” he protested. “I 
can’t think of another place where the boy might 
be, and I thought perhaps we had better go back 
and see if they have heard anything at The 
Cedars. If he is back there, safe and sound, we 
are having all our trouble and worry for nothing.” 

“Oh, please don’t go back yet,” begged Tavia. 


$8 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

“I have an idea, Nat,” she added, with sudden 
eagerness. “If Roger has the notion that Joe has 
taken a train from the North Birchlands station, 
what would be more natural than for him to head 
stationwards himself?” 

“Brilliant mind!” ejaculated Nat, manipulating 
the car into another right-about-face. “We will 
proceed to the station immediately.” 

“But not by the main road, Nat,” urged Ta- 
via. “Through the woods, by that old wagon 
road, don’t you remember?’ 

Nat regarded her as though he thought she 
might have gone temporarily insane. 

“But, my dear girl, why-” he began, but 

Tavia impatiently interrupted him. 

“Oh, you men are so stupid!” she cried. “You 
never can think of anything without a map to 
help you. Can’t you see that Roger, hoping to 
escape attention, would take the path through the 
woods, rather than go by the main thorough¬ 
fare?” 

“Yes, I can,” replied Nat. “But I am very 
doubtful as to whether we shall be able to guide 
the old Fire Bird through that same path you 
mention. The wagon road is almost entirely over¬ 
grown with rank grass and weeds, you know. It 
would be a clever trick to navigate it in the day 
time, and now, as you can see for yourself, the 
twilight approachs on rapid feet.” 



THE SEARCH 


59 

“Then we will park the car and walk,” said 
Tavia imperiously. “Nat, won’t you do this much 
for me?” 

“My dear, I would do far more than that for 
you,” Nat assured her, and Tavia’s bright eyes 
softened at his tone. 

They turned the Fire Bird in the direction of 
the woods, found the old wagon road, and drove 
along it as far as they were able. 

Then Nat helped Tavia to the rough ground 
and they started on a walk that was more nearly a 
run. Having come this far, Tavia found herself 
obsessed by the belief that there was urgent need 
of haste. 

She would have rushed blindly on through the 
shadow-filled woods had not Nat, at her elbow, 
gently restrained her, urging that she take her 
time. 

“Nothing will be gained if you stumble over a 
root and break your leg,” he told her, and Tavia 
replied indignantly that she had no intention of 
being so foolish. 

“I feel as though Roger were in danger of some 
sort, Nat,” she said, during one of those pauses 
when they had sent their combined voices echoing 
and reechoing through the woods. “I feel as 
though we ought to run every step of the way.” 

“And probably Roger is at The Cedars, en¬ 
joying his dinner by this time,” rejoined Nat, as 


6 o DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 


they started on again. “Don’t let your imagina¬ 
tion run away with you, my dear.” 

Her nerves already on edge, Tavia was about 
to retort sharply but closed her lips just in time. 
Nothing would be gained by quarreling with Nat. 
They would only waste time. 

They hurried on until they came out of the 
woodland and found themselves almost upon the 
North Birchlands station. 

They inquired of the agent at the ticket office 
whether a small boy had come that way and the 
man replied in the negative. 

Discouraged, they turned to go back the way 
they had come. They walked on in troubled si¬ 
lence, wondering how they could break this bad 
news to Dorothy. 

“He may have wandered off into the woods 
and been unable to find his way out,” suggested 
Tavia, and Ned agreed with her that he might. 

“Although Joe and Roger know these woods 
like a book,” he added. “Roger probably could¬ 
n’t get lost in them if he tried.” 

“Anyway, we had better look around a bit,” 
Tavia insisted. “I am dreadfully worried, Nat.” 

Nat took her hand, and, like two children, they 
started into the denser part of the woodland, 
calling as they went. 

“It’s like hunting for a needle in a haystack,” 
Nat said at last, as they paused to rest. “We 


THE SEARCH 61 

might do this all night and still not be any nearer 
finding Roger.” 

“But, anyway, we can try, Nat,” Tavia per¬ 
sisted. “I can’t bear to go back to Doro empty- 
handed. She will be crazy.” 

So they went on again, calling as they went, 
until the woods began to grow really dark and 
even Tavia was almost ready to give up the search 
for the time being. 

“My one hope is that while we have been look¬ 
ing for him he has found his way back to The 
Cedars,” she said, as they started slowly back to¬ 
ward the weed-choked wagon road. “If he isn’t 
there I don’t know what we can do.” 

“Listen! I thought I heard something!” Nat 
checked her, a hand on her arm. 

Tavia paused obediently and in the almost eerie 
silence of the woodland she could hear her heart 
throbbing. 

“What do you mean?” she gasped. “I didn’t 
hear anything.” 

“There it is again—over this way,” cried Nat, 
and began to run, pulling the girl with him. 


CHAPTER IX 


IN THE TREE 

In a moment Tavia too heard it—a boyish cry 
in that vast, silent woodland. 

“Roger!” she panted, almost sobbing. “Oh, 
Nat, is it Roger?” 

“Guess so,” said Nat grimly. “But I declare 
I don’t know where the boy can be. Sounds as 
if he were hanging in the air somewhere over our 
heads.” 

“Listen a moment,” suggested Tavia. 

They paused, and again they heard the faint 
cry. It was strangely like and yet unlike Roger’s 
voice. It seemed, as Nat had said, to come from 
the air above them. An eerie sensation at that 
hour in the fast-darkening woods. 

Tavia felt the hair beginning to creep on her 
scalp, yet it was she urged Nat on again. 

They knew they were coming nearer that voice, 
for it sounded continually louder in their ears. 
Yet they still could not locate it. 

At last, when they were about ready to give up 
in despair, Tavia was startled to hear the voice 
again, and, this time, right over her head. 

63 


IN THE TREE 


63 

“I’m up here,” it said quaveringly. “And I 
can’t hold on much longer. If you don’t give me 
a hand I’ll fall and break my neck!” 

Tavia felt an hysterical desire to laugh. Roger 
was up in a tree. Of course! How foolish of 
them not to have thought of that sooner. 

Nat, after one eager glance up into the shad¬ 
owy branches of the tree, had already begun to 
scale its rough bark. 

“Hold on for a minute, old man,” he shouted 
to the disembodied voice aloft. “I’ll bring you 
down in a jiffy.” 

“But my hand’s slipping.” wailed the voice 
again. “You’d better hurry, Nat. O0-00—I’m 
gonna fall!” 

Alarmed at this prohecy in spite of Nat’s rapid 
progress toward the rescue, Tavia went close to 
the tree, straining her eyes to catch a glimpse of 
the small form hidden among the branches. 

“I’m here, Roger darling! It’s Tavia,” she 
called. “If you have to let go I’ll catch you! I 
will if it kills us both!” 

“He isn’t going to let go—he isn’t that kind 
of bad sport,” said Nat’s voice above her head. 
“I’ll grab you in a minute, kid. Can you slide 
along that branch a bit. That’s the idea. Take 
it easy, now.” 

“I—I’ll try,” said Roger’s voice faintly, and 
Tavia heard a rustle among the leaves that told 


64 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

her the boy was doing his best to aid his rescuer. 

“Ow, I’m slipping!” he yelled suddenly. “Catch 
me, Nat!” 

Tavia felt a cold chill run up and down her 
spine at that frantic cry, but the next moment she 
was reassured. 

“All right, old timer, I’ve got you,” said Nat’s 
voice. “Just grab hold of me now and we’ll be 
down on terra firma in a jiffy. That’s the kid! 
Ready now?” 

“Y-yes,” came Roger’s unsteady response, and 
Tavia knew he was fighting off the tears of weari¬ 
ness and fright. “We ain’t very far from the 
ground, though, are we, Nat?” 

“Not very far, old boy,” responded Nat jocu¬ 
larly. “Not half as far as if we were twice as 
far.” 

Tavia heard Roger chuckle and blessed Nat for 
his quick tact. He had saved the small boy the 
humiliation of tears. 

There was the sound of scrambling and slid¬ 
ing and Tavia saw Nat, one arm about Roger, 
hang from a sturdy lower branch, then drop to 
the ground. 

He set his small cousin gently on the ground 
and carefully brushed the leaves and twigs from 
his clothing. 

“Now you’ll do, old man,” he announced, add¬ 
ing suddenly: “Pretty near starved, aren’t you?” 


IN THE TREE 


65 

“Itt-I— guess so,” returned Roger quaveringly, 
and Tavia longed to put her arms about him and 
comfort him. She knew better, however, and 
merely took his hand firmly in her own and led 
the way back to the old wagon road and the wait¬ 
ing Fire Bird. 

“We’ve got the car and we will have you home 
in a jiffy, Roger,” she said cheerfully. “I reckon 
the folks there will be glad to see you.” 

“Dorothy will be awful scared, I guess,” he! 
remarked hesitantly. “It must be awful late.” 

“It is and she will,” Tavia retorted promptly, 
and at the hint of reproach in her voice the small 
boy seemed once more on the verge of tears. 

“I couldn’t help it,” he cried, with a catch in 
his voice that he could not control no matter how 
hard he tried. “I—I just had to find Joe an’ 
tell him—something,” he finished weakly. 

“Well, did you?” asked Nat, with good-natured 
sarcasm. 

“No,” admitted Roger dispiritedly. “I thought 
I might maybe take the train because that must ’a’ 
been the way Joe went, but I just happened to 
think that I didn’t have any money.” 

“That is apt to be a slight drawback,” admitted 
Nat gravely, and thereupon launched into a short 
lecture on the wickedness of small boys who went 
anywhere without first gaining the consent of 
those at home. 


66 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 


“But Joe did it,” Roger interrupted once, won- 
deringly. “And Joe is not a bad boy.” 

“He is at least unwise,” murmured Tavia, and 
Nat was forced to explain that Joe, though not 
in any sense wicked, had been foolish and thought¬ 
less to do the thing he had done. 

“But I just had to go and find him,” Roger 
persisted. “And how could I do it if I didn’t 
take the train?” 

At the prospect of having to begin his lecture 
all over again, Nat gave up in despair and 
changed the subject. 

“Do you mind telling me, old lad,” he asked 
gravely, “how you happened to be using that 
tree for a parking place-” 

“And a rather insecure one at that,” murmured 
Tavia, with a chuckle. 

“At an hour when, by all rights, you should 
have been at home and in bed?” finished Nat. 

Tavia felt the small boy’s hand tighten in hers 
and knew that he was about to recall what had 
been, to him, a rather dreadful experience. 

“I was walking around in the woods, thinking 
I might find Joe,” he explained, “when I saw 
something funny and black coming through the 
woods.” 

“Oh,” shivered Tavia, in mock terror. “How 
terrible! What was it?” 

“It was only a dog, but I thought it was a 



IN THE TREE 67 

bear.” By the disgust in his voice it was evident 
his mistake had chagrined the boy deeply. 

“And you climbed a tree to get away from the 
bear?” suggested Nat. “Am I right?” 

“It was as easy as pie getting up,” Roger 
agreed. 

“But when you tried to get down you found 
you had bitten off more than you could chew, eh?” 
asked Tavia. 

Roger was offended. 

“Ah, you fellers won’t let a kid tell his own 
story!” he complained, and Tavia had all she 
could do to keep from going off into fresh spasms 
of laughter and thus offending the boy still more 
deeply. 

Tavia could hear Nat chuckle in the darkness, 
though his voice was tremendously grave as he 
apologized. 

“Awfully sorry, old chap,” he said. “We will 
try to do better from now on. What happened 
next?” 

“Nothing—nothing much, anyway,” responded 
Roger, partially mollified. “When I saw it was 
only a dog and he just sniffed and went away I 
tried to get down again and I couldn’t. I had 
got away out near the end of the branch, because 
bears can climb trees, you know-” 

“But this wasn’t a bear,” Tavia reminded him 
gravely. 


68 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 


“Well, I didn’t know that when I was climbing 
out there, did I?” demanded Roger peevishly, 
and Nat’s hand closed over Tavia’s with a warn¬ 
ing pressure. 

“And when I tried to get back again,” Roger 
continued, “I couldn’t. I tried and I tried and 
then I tried yelling. But nobody must uv heard 
me, because nobody came,” he concluded dole¬ 
fully. 

“Except us! Don’t forget your old Uncle Nat, 
my boy,” Nat reminded him. 

“Oh, you’re not my uncle; you’re just my cou¬ 
sin,” Roger retorted, and Tavia giggled. 

“How’s that for gratitude?” she crowed, and 
Nat chuckled. 

“Anyway, you have to admit—uncle or cousin 
—that I turned the trick and got you down,” he 
said to Roger. 

“Yes,” the small boy admitted, adding remi¬ 
niscently: “But you did pinch my arm something 
awful!” 

While this was happening, Dorothy, all un¬ 
conscious of it, was having an exciting adventure 
of her own. 

Ned White had come to her soon after Tavia 
and Nat had left The Cedars on their quest for 
the missing Roger and revealed excitedly that he 
thought he had “raked up” a clue that might 


IN THE TREE 69 

throw light on the mysterious circumstances sur¬ 
rounding Joe’s disappearance. 

“I met a fellow who lives at Scranting,” he 
said, mentioning a township some miles further 
out than North Birchlands. “He says that he re¬ 
members seeing a chap around the railroad station 
there who might answer Joe’s description. It’s 
only a chance, Dorothy—the boy probably was 
not Joe at all—but it seems to me the clue is worth 
following up.” 

“Any clue is worth following up,” cried Doro¬ 
thy, instantly aquiver with hope. “Are you going 
to Scranting now? Because if you are, I am going 
with you.” 

Ned hesitated. 

“It is almost dinner time,” he reminded her, 
but Dorothy broke in impatiently. 

“Oh, what difference does that make? We can 
snatch a bite in Scranting if we have to. Ned, 
you mustn’t put me off.” 

“But there’s another thing, Dot,” Ned demur¬ 
red, troubled. “I went to get out the Fire Bird 
just now and she isn’t in the garage. Nat must 
have beaten me to it. He and Tavia are among 
the missing. Joy riding, probably.” 

Dorothy’s brow clouded. If, as Ned suggested, 
her chum and Nat were joy riding, such a pro¬ 
cedure seemed heartless to her, in view of all the 


70 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

trouble at The Cedars. Then, too, Tavia might 
have guessed that they would need the car. 

In the excitement of her father’s illness and this 
new announcement of Ned’s, she had not yet re¬ 
marked the absence of Roger. 

Now she turned to Ned decisively. 

“We will go by train then. There is one that 
leaves North Rirchlands in half an hour. Can 
we make it?” 


CHAPTER X 


A CLUE 

Ned opined that they could make the train and 
he and Dorothy began immediately to get ready. 

Dorothy stole one of the precious minutes to 
tell Major Dale where they were going and why, 
for she knew that hope, even if only temporary, 
would benefit him. 

“I hate to leave him,” she told Ned, as they 
hurried down the stairs. “He seems so much 
brighter when I am with him.” 

“And no wonder!” said Ned gallantly. Then 
as he stole a glance at Dorothy’s weary face, he 
went on: “Poor little Dot! If she could only 
divide herself in about six pieces every one would 
be happy!” 

“Except Dot, perhaps,” said Dorothy ruefully. 

They made the train with time to spare and 
settled back to endure the short trip to Scranting. 
Their minds were so filled with hopes and fears 
and questionings that they found little to say to 
each other. 

Ned was thinking for the most part of pretty 
Jennie Haygood, to whom he had become engaged 
71 


72 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

during her last visit to the The Cedars, and wish¬ 
ing that he might run down and “have a talk with 
her.” But with all the trouble and worry at The 
Cedars, he felt, and rightly, that his first duty 
was to those at home. He would help Dorothy 
to find Joe and then, he declared grimly to him¬ 
self, he would see Jennie every day for at least 
three months I 

Dorothy’s thoughts were of her father and of 
Joe and—of Garry. If Garry were only here to 
help her! 

The train stopped at Scranting with a jolt and 
Ned helped Dorothy to alight. 

“This fellow I spoke of who thought he saw 
Joe here works for the railroad,” he hurriedly ex¬ 
plained, as they started along the platform. “He 
says the ticket agent here is an acquaintance of 
his and may be able to give us valuable informa¬ 
tion.” 

“Then let’s hurry,” urged Dorothy, soon add¬ 
ing in a voice only a little above a whisper: “Oh, 
Ned, I am frightened!” 

“What about?” asked her cousin wonderingly. 

“Oh, I am so afraid he may not be able to tell 
us anything!” 

They found the ticket agent an agreeable man, 
and, as this was not the rush hour with him, he 
obligingly came forth from the small room at the 
back of the station to answer their questions. 


A CLUE 


73 

Ned explained to him about Geoffrey Hodgson, 
the man who thought he had seen Joe in Scranting 
and who had referred Ned for further informa¬ 
tion to the railroad man. 

“From your description I am very sure I saw 
the lad,” the agent returned, and Dorothy leaned 
forward scarcely breathing for fear of losing his 
next words. “Perhaps it was his air of haste 
that particularly impressed itself upon my mind.” 

“Did this boy come here to board a train?” 
asked Dorothy, and the words, the first she had 
spoken, sounded strange to her. 

The man nodded and in his eyes were both sym¬ 
pathy and admiration. There was no doubt that 
the young lady was extremely pretty and neither 
was there any doubt that she was very much con¬ 
cerned with the actions of this particular young 
runaway scamp. He had a sudden and very sin¬ 
cere desire to help Dorothy Dale in whatever 
way he could. 

“He took the four-fifteen for the West, Miss,” 
he said. “It was a flyer, and I guess that suited 
the young gentleman all right for he certainly 
seemed in a tremendous hurry.” 

“The West!” murmured Dorothy, and a bright 
spot began to burn in each cheek. For Dorothy 
was suddenly possessed of an idea. 

“That reminds me, I have something to show 
you,” said their obliging informant, rising sud- 


74 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

denly to his feet. “If you will wait just a minute 
•-” and he returned hurriedly to his office. 

Ned and Dorothy looked at each other and the 
young man shook his head ruefully. 

“Not much help,” he said. “Doesn’t do us 
over much good to know that Joe took a train 
for the West.” 

Dorothy pursed her lips and looked mysterious. 

“I am not so sure!” she said. 

Ned stared, but before he could open his lips 
to ask the question that trembled on them the 
agent was back again, holding something in his 
hand. 

He sat down beside Dorothy and held some¬ 
thing out to her which she found on closer in¬ 
spection to be a cap. 

She gave a little cry and caught it in her hands, 
gazing at it with misted eyes. For it was not 
just any cap. It was Joe’s cap! 

“What’s the row?” asked Ned curiously. 
“What’s that you’ve got?” 

Dorothy could not speak, but in silence handed 
the cap to him. 

Ned gave a low whistle. 

“Exhibit A,” he muttered. “There isn’t a doubt 
in the world but what this is Joe’s head gear! 
What do you make of that, Dot?” 

Dorothy shook her head and turned to the 
interested railroad man. 



A CLUE 75 

“Do you mind telling me where you got that 
cap?” she said unsteadily. 

“The lad left it behind in his hurry,” he re¬ 
plied. “I saw it lying on the bench and, think¬ 
ing the boy might return for it, put it away in thd 
office.” 

“Oh, that was awfully good of you,” said Doro¬ 
thy. “You don’t know how very much this means 
to me.” 

The agent looked embarrassed, for he was one 
of those kind-hearted men who cannot take thanks 
gracefully and, as several people entered the 
station at that moment, he excused himself and 
took his place again at the window. 

Seeing that they had all the information they 
were likely to get from this source, Ned pocketed 
the cap that Joe had left behind him and they 
crossed the tracks to the opposite platform of the 
station, there to take the return train to North 
Birchlands. 

On the way back Ned was excited and talkative 
but Dorothy was very quiet. 

“Why is it that every kid who wants to run 
away immediately heads west?” asked Ned of 
an inattentive and thoughtful Dorothy. “Some¬ 
times they make a break for the seacoast, but 
more often it is the wild and woolly that tempts 
the youthful imagination. Say, Dot,” he added, 
struck by a sudden thought, “why in the world 


76 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

didn’t we ask that fellow how far west Joe was 
going?” 

“Because we are a couple of idiots, I guess,” 
returned Dorothy. “However, we can still ask 
him—by telephone.” 

“How much money did the boy have?” asked 
Ned, with apparent irrelevance. 

“Not much,” replied Dorothy sadly. “He 
couldn’t have got so very far, Ned.” 

It seemed only a moment before the train 
slowed to a stop at North Birchlands. Dorothy 
and Ned walked rapidly homewards, eager to 
share this new development with the family. But 
when they reached The Cedars they found so 
much worry and excitement rampant there that 
they temporarily forgot their own adventures. 

Roger was gone, had disappeared as com¬ 
pletely, it seemed, as Joe! 

Dorothy sank down in a chair and covered her 
eyes with her hand. 

“This is too much,” she said. “I don’t believe 
I can stand any more.” 

Then she was on her feet in an instant again 
her eyes bright, cheeks hot. 

“No one has told Dad this?” she asked, and 
her Aunt Winnie replied quickly and soothingly 
in the negative. 

“We would not have told him in any case until 
you returned, dear,” she said, soon adding, with 


attempted reassurance: “I really don’t think this 
is serious.” 

“Serious!” repeated Dorothy. “Not serious 
that little Roger is lost, as well as Joe?” Then 
she asked, looking about her as though she had 
missed her chum for the first time: “Where is 
Tavia?” 

“She and Nat have not come in yet,” replied 
Mrs. White, the worried lines deepening in her 
forehead. “I can’t imagine what can be keeping 
them.” 

Then Dorothy remembered. Tavia and Nat 
had gone out in the Fire Bird. Even her chum 
had deserted her. She felt suddenly very helpless 
and forlorn. 

There came the sound of an automobile on the 
drive without, the sharp tooting of a motor horn 
—undeniably the Fire Bird. 

They all dashed to the door and flung it open 
just as Tavia’s glad cry rang through the dark¬ 
ness: 

“Hello, everybody. We’ve got Roger!” 


CHAPTER XI 


DOROTHY REACHES A DECISION 

Tavia made a rush for Dorothy and caught 
her in her arms, hugging her hard. 

“Darling Doro, see what we’ve brought you,” 
she cried, and drew forward into the circle of 
light a sheepish and very much subdued Roger. 

Dorothy sank to her knees before Roger and 
hugged him to her until he grunted. This was 
purely physical, however, for the returned prodi¬ 
gal was willing for once that his big sister should 
make as much fuss over him as she wished. It 
was not much fun to be stuck up in a tree far 
away from home and it was most awfully good to 
be with his family again. Then, too, he had 
feared a scolding and Dorothy’s greeting was a 
welcome substitute. 

It was some time before they were calm enough 
to discuss the details of the rescue. But when 
finally Nat and Tavia did describe the small boy’s 
peril and rescue, Dorothy was ashamed to think 
how she had misjudged her chum. She ought to 
have known by this time how right Tavia’s heart 
was where her friends were concerned. 

78 


REACHING A DECISION 


79 


They had dinner then, a merry one in spite of 
the shadow of worry and anxiety that still hung 
heavy on their minds. Despite his famished state, 
Roger was so exhausted by the strenuous and ex¬ 
citing events of the past few hours that he almost 
fell asleep in his chair and had to be helped to 
bed before he had half finished his dinner. 

Dorothy, looking down at his sleeping face, so 
dear and innocent on the pillow, felt her eyes 
smart with fresh tears. Kneeling down beside the 
bed, she pressed her cheek to his soft one. 

“Don’t ever do a thing like that again,” she 
whispered. “What would Doro do if anything 
happened to her Roger?” 

One small arm twined about her neck and 
Roger half opened his eyes, smiled sleepily. 

“Roger—loves—Doro,” he murmured, and 
fell asleep. 

On the way downstairs Dorothy stopped in the 
Major’s room to see how he fared and found him 
also asleep. She would not disturb him now till 
morning although she knew how eagerly he would 
grasp at the one small item of news concerning 
Joe that she had to tell him. 

If Joe were only there too, beneath the familiar 
roof, asleep—Dorothy sighed, closed the door 
gently, and went on downstairs. 

“Ned has just been telling us about Joe’s cap, 
Doro,” said Tavia, as she entered the room. “Is- 


8 o DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 


n’t it marvelous? We have an honest-to-good- 
ness clue at last.” 

“Although I can’t see where it leads us-” 

“To the West, of course,” interrupted Tavia. 
“How dull you are, Nat.” 

Nat grinned good-naturedly. 

“The West is a large place, young lady,” he 
reminded her. “And one that it is possible for 
a lad to get pretty completely lost in.” 

“We will find to-morow what town or city he 
bought his ticket to,” said Dorothy. “And then 
we can act accordingly.” 

“That sounds as if the fair Dorothy were 
about to get busy in earnest,” said Tavia, with a 
shrewd glance at her chum. “Have you made any 
plans yet, Doro?” 

“Nothing definite,” Dorothy confessed. “I 
want to talk with Dad first.” 

It was Major Dale himself who asked for 
Dorothy on the following morning, and father 
and daughter were closeted together for the better 
part of an hour. 

When Dorothy at last emerged from the inter¬ 
view her cheeks were flushed and her mouth de¬ 
termined. 

Tavia, who had been eagerly awaiting an op¬ 
portunity to talk to her chum, was the first to 
notice this change in her. 



REACHING A DECISION 


81 


“You look as though you were on the war path, 
Doro. What’s up?” 

Dorothy held a finger to her lips as Ned’s voice 
at the telephone came up to them. 

“He’s calling Scranting,” Dorothy explained in 
a whisper. “Listen!” 

They listened with breathless interest to Ned’s 
disjointed monologue. 

“This Mr. Dougherty, Scranting station? Mr. 
Dougherty, Miss Dale and I forgot to ask you a 
very important question last night—. Oh, you 
thought of it too, did you?—Chicago! Where 
did the kid get all that money?—Yes.—All right. 
Many thanks for the information.—Yes, I will.— 
Thanks again. Good-bye!” 

“Chicago!” repeated Tavia, whistling softly. 
“That city is a considerable distance from this 
place, Doro. Why, what’s the matter?” She 
broke off and stared at her chum wonderingly. 

For, impossible as it seemed to her, Dorothy’s 
lips had curved suddenly in such a smile as Tavia 
had not seen for days. 

“Oh, nothing!” said this amazing Doro. “I 
was just thinking that intuition is a wonderful 
thing sometimes!” 

Even by persistent questioning Tavia was not 
able to discover the reason for what she called 
Dorothy’s “Mona Lisa smile,” but she did succeed 
in extracting other valuable information. 


82 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 


Dorothy was to follow the one clue they pos¬ 
sessed, though it was a slight one. 

“But how on earth can you go out West all 
alone, Doro?” cried Tavia, when her chum had 
announced her decision to the rather startled and 
excited family group. 

“I didn’t intend to,” returned Dorothy with 
assumed ingenuousness. “I thought perhaps one, 
Tavia Travers, would like to go with me.” 

“Good gracious, I was only scared to death for 
fear you wouldn’t ask me,” Tavia confessed. 
“When do we start, Doro?” 

“Hold your horses a minute, will you?” cried 
Nat. “You two girls aren’t going on a journey 
like that all alone—not by a long shot!” 

“O-ho! The cave man speaks!” gibed Tavia. 
“Who says we are not, Mr. Smarty?” 

“You really ought to stay here, Nat,” Dorothy 
interposed swiftly. “We need both you and Ned 
here on the spot, both to take care of Dad and 
follow up any new clue that may turn up.” 

“Well, I like that!” exclaimed Nat, chagrined. 
“That’s being relegated to the rocking chair for 
fair.” 

“But you will do that for me, won’t you, Nat?” 
begged Dorothy. “Can’t you see it’s the best 
way?” 

“Well, no, I can’t say that I can,” confessed 


REACHING A DECISION 83 

Nat. “But if you want it that way, Dot, I can 
but oblige.” 

“What are you going to do after you reach 
Chicago?” Mrs. White asked. “Have you 
thought of that?” 

“I suppose we shall have to leave our future 
conduct to chance,” said Tavia flippantly, and 
Dorothy slowly nodded acquiescence. 

“We may come up against a dead wall,” Doro¬ 
thy admitted. “But there is just a chance that 
we may pick up a clue there that will be useful. 
Anyway, Dad thinks the chance is worth taking, 
and I do too.” 

So it was decided that the two girls were to 
start for Chicago the following day, “traveling 
light.” 

After they had gone to their rooms that night 
and Tavia was brushing her hair before the mir¬ 
ror, Dorothy stole in to her and whispered: 

“Tavia, if I tell you a secret will you promise 
never to tell a soul?” 


CHAPTER XII 


A GUESS 

“Cross my heart and hope to die,” said Tavia. 
“Tell me quickly ere I pass away with suspense.” 

“Well, I have a very good suspicion which way 
Joe headed. 

“He headed West-” 

“Exactly! And straight for the ranch of one 
young Westerner called Garry Knapp.” 

Tavia looked at her chum hard for a moment, 
then waved the hair brush aloft in a jubilant ges¬ 
ture. 

“I do believe you have struck it, Doro!” she 
cried. “Of course that is the obvious thing for 
him to do.” 

“He always loved Garry*-” 

“Seems to run in the family,’V interrupted 
Tavia. 

“And he would naturally go to him for help 
and advice at this time.” 

“He hasn’t reached his objective yet, if Garry’s 
ranch is the objective,” Tavia pointed out. “If 
he had, Garry would have telegraphed.” 

“I’ve thought of that, of course,” admitted 
84 




A GUESS 


85 

Dorothy. “But then, if he went directly he has 
hardly had time yet. Anyway, there is no use 
guessing any longer,” and she rose abruptly from 
the bed and gave Tavia a good-night hug. “To¬ 
morrow we begin to act.” 

“For which, thanks be!” said Tavia fervently. 

It was a very much disgruntled Nat who saw 
them off the following morning. The waiting end 
of a game was never a pleasant one to him. And, 
it meant losing Tavia for an indefinite time! 

However, Tavia managed to tear herself away 
finally, and after Dorothy also had been hugged 
and kissed the train moved off and the two girls 
sank back in their seats with a feeling of relief 
that at last their adventure was in motion. 

Tavia brought forth the two-pound box of 
candy that the boys had bestowed upon her and 
her chum and began contentedly to untie the rib¬ 
bon that bound it. 

“Have one, Doro?” The latter shook her 
head. She was too full of anxiety for Joe and 
the dear ones at home to think about anything 
else. 

The Major had seemed very frail that morning 
when he had said good-bye, but there had been 
ah eager light in his eyes that she understood only 
too well. He had been thinking that the next 
time he saw his daughter, Joe might be with her. 

And Joe would be with her! Dorothy’s chin 


86 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 


went up and her eyes gleamed in a manner curi¬ 
ously suggestive of the Major in the days when 
the success of the Bugle meant everything to him. 

“Good gracious, Doro, don’t look like that!” 
cried Tavia, happening that moment to glance at 
her chum. “You remind me of bulldogs and prize 
fighters and other pugnacious animals.” 

“How extremely complimentary you are,” 
laughed Dorothy. “I’ll have you know that though 
I can’t get over the fact that I’m an animal, I’m 
not pugnacious.” 

“Far be it from me to contradict a lady,” re¬ 
torted Tavia. “But if you could have seen your¬ 
self at that moment, Doro, I am sure you would¬ 
n’t blame me.” 

“Glad I didn’t then,” replied Dorothy a trifle 
crossly. “It must be an awful bore to see your¬ 
selves as others see you.” 

“Well, take off your hat, anyway,” advised 
Tavia irrelevantly. “We have quite a little ride 
before us, you know.” 

“As if I hadn’t lain awake all night thinking 
of that!” cried Dorothy. “And every minute of 
the journey will seem like an hour.” 

“Now who is being uncomplimentary?” chuck¬ 
led Tavia. “You must expect to enjoy your 
company.” 

“I don’t expect to enjoy anything again until I 


A GUESS 87 

get news of Joe,” answered Dorothy morosely, 
and Tavia sighed gustily. 

“Here’s where all my efforts at entertainment 
fall upon barren ground,” she prophesied. “Like 
casting pearls before swine, you know.” 

“Are you, by any chance, calling me names?” 
asked Dorothy, giggling in spite of herself. 

“I wouldn’t do such a thing,” protested Tavia 
virtuously. “I was thinking of that cute little pig 
I just saw beside the road. Honestly, he was 
awfully cute. His tail was all curled up and he 
had the pinkest nose-” 

“Goodness, Tavia, if you can’t be sensible I 
am going out and sit on the observation platform 
by myself. I don’t want to hear about pigs.” 

“I don’t know but what your suggestion about 
the observation platform is a good one, at that,” 
remarked Tavia, unmoved. “Did you notice that 
perfectly stunning man who passed through our 
car a few minutes ago? He looked straight 
at you and you looked straight through him.” 

“Was he a ghost?” giggled Dorothy. 

“Far from it!” returned Tavia, with a reprov¬ 
ing stare. “He was an extremely substantial look¬ 
ing young man, and from the way he looked at 
you I shouldn’t wonder but that your amazing 
beauty had quite bowled him over, Doro, my 
dear.” 

“Well, I hope he stays bowled,” returned Doro- 



88 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 


thy unfeelingly. “Something tells me that’s where 
he belongs.” 

“Pearls before—” began Tavia, but this time 
Dorothy rebelled. 

“I won’t be called a pig again, Tavia Tra¬ 
vers !” 

“Such a cute little pig!” 

Dorothy fumbled at the car window and looked 
back at Tavia suggestively. 

“Will you stop, or shall I jump?” 

“Better wait till the train slows down a bit,” 
replied Tavia calmly. “Going at this rate of 
speed, you might skin your knuckles or some¬ 
thing.” 

Dorothy sank back in her seat with a sigh of 
resignation. 

“I think I shall go to the observation platform, 
after all,” she said, but before she could rise 
Tavia seized her arm and cried excitedly: 

“He is coming back!” 

Dorothy shook her arm free and frowned. 

“Well, what of it?” 

“And he has a companion,” added Tavia. 
“Good gracious, if I ever saw a desperado, Doro¬ 
thy Dale, that man is it!” 

Interested in spite of herself by Tavia’s des¬ 
cription, Dorothy turned her head and beheld 
two men approaching down the car aisle, lurch¬ 
ing as the train lurched. 


A GUESS 


89 

One was the tall, dark, good-looking stranger 
who Tavia had vulgarly declared was “bowled 
over” by Dorothy’s beauty. His companion could 
not have been more completely his opposite. A 
short, squat fellow with a flat face and sharp 
black eyes, he looked for all the world like a bird 
of prey, ready to snatch at his victim. 

Dorothy, as she shudderingly appraised the 
man, was glad she was not to be his victim. The 
next moment she was laughing at her melodrama¬ 
tic thoughts. 

“Probably a traveling salesman or something 
equally innocuous,” she whispered, as the two» 
men passed close to them. 

“He’s a desperado,” Tavia reiterated stub¬ 
bornly. “You mark my words—that fellow will 
come to no good end—” 

At that moment it seemed as if they all were 
to come to a very bad end indeed. 

There came a deafening crash and the car in 
which Dorothy and Tavia sat seemed to rear up 
in the middle, like a balky horse. 

“Good gracious, hold on to me, Doro!” 
shrieked Tavia. “It’s the end of the world!” 


CHAPTER XIII 


DERAILED 

There was shrieking and confusion from one 
end of the train to the other as the car righted 
itself again. With a horrid noise of scraping 
brakes the cars ahead came to a jolting stand¬ 
still. 

Tavia was out of her seat bent on joining the 
general stampede for the door, but Dorothy held 
her back firmly. 

“You will be hurt in that rush!” she cried. 
“Wait a minute; do, Tavia.” 

Tavia obeyed, and crouched down in the seat 
and covered her eyes with her trembling hands. 

“Oh, listen to those cries, Doro!” she wailed 
presently. “Somebody must be horribly hurt.” 

“Just hysterics, Miss.” 

A man, one of those who had been the first to 
jump from the train, returned and sank into a 
seat opposite the two girls. “The car ahead of 
us jumped the track, and it’s a mercy the whole 
train wasn’t wrecked. As it is, they ain’t nothing 
to worry about, except that we may be tied up 
here for some considerable time.” 


90 


DERAILED 


9 i 


Tavia uncovered her eyes and looked at him. 
Dorothy had already done so and had risen from 
her seat and started hastily for the door, because 
this man who had undertaken to reassure them 
was none other than the villainous-looking com¬ 
panion of the tall dark stranger! 

At her sudden motion the man put out his hand 
and made as though to rise. 

“Better not go out there just now, Miss,” he 
said, his beady black eyes resting upon her ad¬ 
miringly. “The crowd is still mighty hysterical 
and it’s possible you might get hurt.” 

Dorothy might have retorted that she prefer¬ 
red the hysterical crowd to the doubtful pleasure 
of his company, but she held her tongue. 

Instead she smiled noncommittally and held 
out her hand to Tavia. 

“Come along, dear,” she begged. “There may 
be something we can do out there.” 

“I tell you there ain’t nobody hurt,” again put 
in the small, squat man in a faintly irritable voice. 
“Better stay right here—” 

But the two girls were already half way to the 
door, Tavia accompanying her chum grumblingly. 

“Every time anything interesting happens, 
Doro, you have to come along and spoil every¬ 
thing.” 

“If you call that fellow interesting, then I am 
disappointed in your common sense,” retorted 


92 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

Dorothy tartly. “Sometimes, Tavia, I really think 
you need a nurse.” 

“Well, any time that I feel like engaging one, 
I’ll tell you,” drawled Tavia, angered in her turn, 
and there fell an uncomfortable silence between 
the girls. 

Mechanically they walked through the excited 
crowd on the platform to the spot where the car 
had jumped the track. There it stood, its wheels 
on the gravel bed of the roadside, tilted crazily 
and only held upright by the cars in front and at 
the rear of it. 

“The people in this car must have been jolted 
up for fair. Thought it was an earthquake or 
something,” murmured Tavia, interest getting 
the better of her anger at Dorothy. “It’s a won¬ 
der we didn’t have an honest-to-goodness wreck 
out of this.” 

“It was the quick wit of the engineer who saved 
us, I guess,” said a musical voice behind her, and, 
astonished, the two girls turned about to find be¬ 
hind them the tall good-looking stranger who had 
caught Tavia’s particular attention. 

The eyes of the irrepressible girl sparkled as 
she muttered in a tone audible only to Dorothy: 

“We can’t run amiss of ’em, no matter how 
hard we try.” 

Dorothy flushed with annoyance and pretended 
she had not heard the man’s observation. Not so 


DERAILED 


93 


Tavia! If for no other reason than to annoy 
her chum she determined to see the adventure 
through. 

“We should get up a vote of thanks and send 
it to the engineer,” she said in her sweetest tones. 
“He really was quite heroic. Fancy saving the 
lives of all the people on this train.” 

“Just fancy!” mimicked Dorothy bitterly, but 
the young man was not to be so easily discouraged. 

He immediately ranged himself beside the two 
girls and launched into a boringly detailed ac¬ 
count of the accident. In the middle of it Dor¬ 
othy excused herself and hurried back to the car. 

Her cheeks were hot and she felt unreasonably 
angry with Tavia. To her mind her chum had 
always been far too easy-going and casual with 
men, and this, Dorothy thought, was going a 
little too far. 

It was not that Tavia had responded to the 
stranger—that might have been excusable under 
the circumstances. It was the manner of her 
response. 

She wondered if the offensive, squat man would 
still be occupying the seat opposite her when she 
returned to the car. She was busy framing a 
scathing speech as she ascended the car steps, but 
was immensely relieved a moment later to find 
that there was no need of delivering it. 

The fellow had evidently been discouraged by 


94 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

her manner—sufficiently, that is, to slightly 
dampen his enthusiasm. 

Yet he still lingered uncomfortably near. Dor¬ 
othy was annoyed and more than a little alarmed 
to find that he occupied a seat in the same car 
with her and Tavia. 

On the entire trip then, they would be forced 
to suffer the annoyance of his presence, to ward 
off his offensive attentions. 

Dorothy could see that he often glanced at 
her over the top of the paper he pretended to 
be reading and knew that it needed only a word 
or a glance from her to bring him instantly to 
her side. 

She wished more than ever that Garry were 
with her. He would know how to deal with of¬ 
fensive strangers who took advantage of the con¬ 
fusion and excitement consequent upon a train 
accident to become familiar. 

She thought of Tavia, still, presumably, busy 
fascinating the good-looking stranger. This was 
always an interesting pastime with Tavia, and it 
would probably be some time before she tired 
of it. 

If she had the audacity to bring that man into 
their car—Dorothy gasped for, out of the corner 
of her eye, she saw that was just what Tavia 
was doing. 

Her color high, she turned and looked steadily 


DERAILED 


95! 

out of the window as Tavia and her latest con¬ 
quest approached. The latter seemed about to 
take the seat his unpleasant friend had so recently 
vacated but a glance at Dorothy’s averted profile 
warned Tavia that, for the time, she had gone 
far enough. 

“Thank you so much!” she said sweetly, sink¬ 
ing into the opposite seat and adroitly placing a 
box of candy—the gift of her new friend—upon 
the other half of the seat, so that there was no 
room left for him. “You are in this car, too, and 
going through to Chicago? How nice! Ah, yes, 
thank you,” as the young man handed her a mag¬ 
azine that had fallen to the floor. 

The latter lingered, indulging in inanities—or 
so Dorothy termed them—with Tavia, but evi¬ 
dently interested in Dorothy’s stubbornly averted 
profile. 

At length, as his room was so patently desired 
to his company, he reluctantly moved on, joining 
his unpleasant friend. 

Tavia looked at Dorothy with a sparkle in her 
eye. Evidently she had been enjoying herself im¬ 
mensely and was in a conciliatory mood. 

“Don’t be mad with me, Doro, darling,” she 
coaxed. “I know I’m a perfect simpleton. But I 
was born that way, you know. I really can’t help 
it.” 

“You could help a good many things, Tavia, 


96 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

if you wanted to,” said Dorothy, turning away 
from the window. “Sometimes I wonder how 
you can be in love with Nat and still act the way 
you do.” 

“Well, I am in love with Nat and that’s all 
that matters—to Nat and me,” retorted Tavia, 
her voice suddenly hard and cold. “I think you 
are too absurdly conventional for words, Dorothy 
Dale. If you insist on being a spoil-sport, then 
you can be one by yourself. I don’t intend to 
help you!” 

And so began the quarrel—the first real one 
the girls had ever had, and one that lasted all 
through that miserable journey to Chicago. 

Tavia, through a perverse desire to torment 
her chum, was almost constantly to be seen in the 
company of the young man whose name, accord¬ 
ing to him, was Stanley Blake. 

Chicago came at last, and with it an immense 
relief to Dorothy Dale. Her relief vanished 
immediately, however, when she found that Stan¬ 
ley Blake had taken the place of a porter and 
was to carry their bags. 

“He shan’t carry mine,” she said, in a sudden 
fury, to Tavia. “If you want to go on being 
an—an-” 

“Idiot. You might as well say it,” Tavia fin¬ 
ished for her. “You can do as you please, Doro. 
If you want to make a scene over such a foolish 



DERAILED 


97 

little thing- Come on, be a sport,” she added, 

suddenly conciliatory again. “What’s your awful 
objection to saving a porter’s tip?” 

Dorothy bit her lips to keep back a flood of 
angry words. She could not very well make a 
scene by refusing the attentions of this man when 
Tavia so casually accepted them. She would, she 
decided, put up with Tavia’s folly once more, 
but, after that— She was fortified by the knowl¬ 
edge that they were now at their journey’s end 
and so would automatically dispense with the com¬ 
pany of Stanley Blake and his fox-eyed friend. 

They were in their room in the Blenheim Hotel 
at last. Tavia and she were alone. 

“Thank goodness, we’re rid of them,” thought 
Dorothy, as she removed her hat and sank wearily 
upon the edge of the hard, hotel bed. “I hope 
I never have to see either of them again.” 

But she did, and that in a way that was not 
only unpleasant but exceedingly startling. 

Descending with Tavia to the hotel dining 
room, Dorothy saw at a table near the door the 
very two persons whom she had so recently and 
fervently wished never to see again! Tavia had 
not seen them yet, and Dorothy prayed fervently 
that she might not. 

The head waiter coming toward them and 
beaming benignly seemed like a rescuing angel 
to Dorothy. She must get Tavia seated some- 



98 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

where, anywhere, before she became aware of 
the presence of Blake and his friend. To have 
again their company thrust upon her was un¬ 
thinkable. 

Even at that last moment she would have 
turned away, urged Tavia to go with her to some 
quiet, small restaurant outside. But it was too 
late. The head waiter already was guiding them 
toward a table. 

The table was next to the one at which Blake 
and his friend sat, at the side and a little to the 
rear of it. Dorothy gasped, would have pro¬ 
tested could she have done so without rousing 
the suspicion of her friend. 

For Tavia was still blissfully unaware of any¬ 
thing unusual in the atmosphere. And the head 
waiter, with a beaming smile, had motioned one 
of the waiters to take their order. 

Well, it couldn’t be helped, thought Dorothy 
resignedly. If Tavia saw them she would have 
to. Lucky the two men were sitting with their 
backs toward the table where the chums were 
ensconced, and, by skillful maneuvering on Dor¬ 
othy’s part, Tavia also had her back turned to 
them. 

Dorothy turned sideways so that only her pro¬ 
file would be exposed to view, if either of the 
men chanced to glance over his shoulder. 

Suddenly she stiffened, for, coming to her with 


DERAILED 


99 


\ 

a startling distinctness above the noise and chat¬ 
tel all about her, she heard a familiar name. 

It was a very familiar name. The two men 
were talking about Garry Knapp! 

“What is the matter, Doro?” asked Tavia, 
looking at her curiously. “You resemble a story¬ 
book detective on the eve of a startling discovery.” 

Dorothy motioned her sharply to be still. 

“They are talking of Garry,” she explained, 
in a tense whisper. 

“Who? When? Where?” cried Tavia, screw¬ 
ing her head about most absurdly in a vain effort 
to bring the entire dining room within her range 
of vision at the same time. “What do you mean, 
Doro?” 

Dorothy gestured toward the two men at the 
table next to them, at the same moment making an 
imploring gesture pleading silence. 

“Why, Stanley Blake and his dear little friend!” 
exclaimed Tavia in a tone of pleased surprise. 
“Always turning up like the proverbial bad penny, 
aren’t they, Doro? Do you mind if I ask them 
to join us?” 

She half rose from the table as if about to 
carry out her preposterous threat, but Dorothy 
seized her fiercely by the arm and forced her 
back into her seat. 

“If you move or say a word, I never will speak 
to you again!” she said, and at the vehemence 


ioo DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 


of the usually gentle Dorothy, Tavia looked sur¬ 
prised. However, she obeyed and remained curi¬ 
ously quiet. 

Dorothy had missed something of what the men 
had said. She realized this with a sharp annoy¬ 
ance. But the next moment a wave of rage and 
fear swept over her, blotting out every other sen¬ 
sation. 

They were not only speaking of Garry, these 
two men, but they were threatening him as well. 
She held her breath so that she might not miss 
one word of what was to follow. 

“He is a kind of simple guy, this Dimples 
Knapp,” the beady-eyed man was saying with a 
half-satisfied smirk. “Thinks this old world is 
made up of goody-goody stiffs who believe in the 
Golden Rule and go to church regular twice on 
Sundays. A cute little lamb to fleece!” 

“And a nice fat, succulent one,” added Stanley 
Blake, in a voice neither of the girls recognized. 
It had a cold, mean quality that made Dorothy 
shiver, though the dining room was hot. 

She glanced at Tavia and saw the look of be¬ 
wilderment and horror on her face. Tavia had 
“caught on” at last. She was beginning to find 
that Dorothy’s aversion to these two men had 
been founded on something very much more real 
than a whim. 

“What does it all mean, Doro?” she whispered, 



“THEY ARE TALKING OF GARRY,” SHE EXPLAINED, 

WHISPER. 


“Dorothy Dale to the Rescue.” 


IN A TENSE 


Page 99 







DERAILED ioi 

but once more Dorothy held up her hand for 
silence. 

“Wait, and perhaps we shall hear,” she said 
tensely. 

“The fellow thinks he’s goin’ to have the best 
l’il wheat ranch in the West,” went on Stanley’s 
companion, pushing back his plate and lighting a 
cigar. “He’s got the cash to do it and—I feel 
forced out o’ the kindness of my heart to say it, 
Cal—he’s got the brains. If it wasn’t for that 
trustin’ little disposition of his—” he did not 
finish the sentence, but ended with a chuckle, a 
thin, mean alien sound in that convivial atmos¬ 
phere. 

Dorothy was the victim of a chill fear. The 
man was like a snake, a mean, poisonous snake 
that would lie treacherously still in a crevice of 
rock awaiting the moment to strike at an un¬ 
suspecting prey. 

She thought of that horrible moment during her 
first trip to Desert City, seemingly ages ago, 
when she had flung the rock that had snuffed out 
the life of the rattlesnake that had threatened 
the life of her chum. She had acted then swiftly, 
unerringly, not thinking of herself, but of Tavia’s 
peril. 

But this was another, a more venomous kind 
of reptile, and something told her he would be 
infinitely harder to deal with. 


102 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 


Stanley Blake was speaking now, and both she 
and Tavia listened breathlessly. 

“You may think this fellow Dimples Knapp is 
easy game, Gibbons, but I know better,” drawled 
the hero of Tavia’s gay moments. “He may be 
as trusting as you say he is, but I tell you he’s got 
friends that were not born yesterday. And they 
weren’t born blind, either.” 

“I s’pose you mean that snoopin’ Lance Pet- 
terby an’ his gang,” snarled the little man, and 
the girls started nervously. “Well, I’m goin’ on 
record now to the effect that if he tries any funny 
business, it’ll be the last time, that’s all. You 
hear me, Cal, it’ll be the last time!” 

“Say, you poor little shrimp, will you cut out 
calling me by my first name? This is the second 
time you’ve done it in the last five minutes. Get¬ 
ting childish or something, aren’t you?” 

The man whose name quite obviously was not 
Stanley Blake glanced hastily about the room as 
he gave vent to these irritable remarks, and Doro¬ 
thy turned hastily aside lest he should recognize 
her profile, and so put an end to his remarkable 
discourse. 

However, though the men continued talking 
and, presumably, on the same subject, it did not 
take Dorothy long to realize that she would hear 
nothing further of importance that day. 

The two men, evidently beset by an excess of 


DERAILED 


103 

caution, had lowered their voices so that it was 
impossible to catch a word of their discourse. 

Although the girls strained their ears, the con¬ 
versation at the next table became only a con¬ 
fused mumbling and soon afterward the two men 
rose and left the dining room. 

Although she had scarcely tasted her lunch, 
Dorothy rose too. 

“Where are you going, Doro?” asked Tavia. 
“To the office,” said Dorothy. “I must send 
a telegram to Garry at once!” 


CHAPTER XIV 


THE WARNING 

It was characteristic of Dorothy Dale that she 
did not once say to Tavia, “I told you so!” She 
might so easily have done so, considering her owri 
distrust of these two men and Tavia’s acceptance 
of them; of one of them, at least. 

As for the latter, she was filled with chagrin 
to find that her handsome stranger was nothing 
but a cheap trickster after all—if indeed, he was 
not worse—and longed fervently to punish “Cal,” 
alias Stanley Blake. 

“Oh, you just watch we snub him the next time 
we meet,” she cried, with relish. “I will make 
him feel about as little as the toy chameleon on 
his watch fob. Did you ever notice that cham¬ 
eleon, Dorothy? It was the most fascinating 
thing I ever saw, fairly hypnotized me.” 

“Something certainly did!” Dorothy retorted 
dryly, which was as near as she ever came to 
saying, “I told you so.” 

“That’s mean, considering that I am so fright¬ 
fully penitent and all that,” Tavia reproached 
her. “Can’t you let bygones be bygones?” 

104 


THE WARNING 


105 

“I am not worrying about what has already- 
happened,” Dorothy returned. “It’s the future 
that troubles me.” 

“Well, I wouldn’t worry about Garry, if I 
were you,” advised her chum. “Our friend Gib¬ 
bons may think he is as innocent as a babe and 
all that, but you and I know better. If there is 
any funny business going on, you can bet Garry 
isn’t blind to it.” 

“But this fellow spoke as if there were others 
plotting against him, too,” said Dorothy, adding 
bitterly: “It isn’t fair, so many against one.” 

“Garry has friends, too, you know,” Tavia 
reminded her. “Even Stanley Blake admits that. 
You can make sure Lance Petterby isn’t the only 
one, either. Garry’s the kind that makes friends. 
Imagine hearing Lance’s name here in the dining 
room of the Blenheim Hotel!” she added with 
a chuckle, as Dorothy’s thoughtful silence still 
continued. “The world is certainly a small place.” 

“As I believe countless thousands have re¬ 
marked before you,” sighed Dorothy. “Oh, 
Tavia, I wish you could say something original— 
think what we ought to do next.” 

“Why, if you mean about Garry, it seems to me 
you have already done about all you can do,” 
returned Tavia. “That telegram will warn him 
to be on his guard.” 

“If only they had gone on talking for a little 


106 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 


while longer/’ sighed Dorothy. “I have a feeling 
that they were about to reveal something that 
might have been enlightening.” 

“Well, no use crying about spilled milk,” said 
Tavia, stretching herself out luxuriously on the 
bed. “If you will excuse me, I think I will take 
a wink or two of sleep. You would be wise to 
do the same. We have had, as I need not tell 
you, a long and tiresome journey.” 

But Dorothy had no intention of taking her 
friend’s advice. In the first place she was so ex¬ 
cited that she could not have slept had she tried. 
In the second, there was the feeling that she 
could not afford to waste a precious minute that 
might bring her nearer to finding Joe or to the 
discovery of just what danger it was that threat¬ 
ened Garry. 

So, while Tavia took her beauty sleep, Dorothy 
brushed her hair, pulled her hat down tight over 
the soft mass of it and sallied forth to do a little 
sleuthing on her own account. 

Joe had bought a ticket for Chicago. On such 
slender information Dorothy undertook the great 
task of finding him. 

She went first to the railroad station and there 
met her first big disappointment. 

If her surmise that Joe had gone to Garry was 
founded on fact, she realized that his first action 
after reaching Chicago would be to buy a ticket 


THE WARNING 


io 7 

for Dugonne, the railroad station nearest to 
Garry’s ranch. 

If she could find any of the ticket agents at 
the station who remembered seeing a lad answer¬ 
ing Joe’s description—it was a slight enough 
hope, but all she had—then she and Tavia might 
carry on the search. 

But after a weary round she decided that even 
this one small hope must perish. No one had 
noticed a lad of Joe’s description and one or two 
were rather short about saying so, intimating that 
they were far too busy to be troubled with trivial 
things. 

Turning away, weary and discouraged, deciding 
to give up the search for that time at least, Doro¬ 
thy was startled by a touch upon her shoulder 
and turned quickly to see a young Italian stand¬ 
ing beside her. 

“Excuse me, Miss,” he said, with a boyish 
eagerness that at once disarmed any annoyance 
Dorothy might have felt at his presumption. “I 
heard you talk to the man over there and maybe 
I can tell you something—not much, but some¬ 
thing.” 

Dorothy’s weary face lit up and she regarded 
the youth pleadingly. She did not speak, but her 
very silence questioned him. 

“I work over there, sell the magazines,” he ex¬ 
plained, making a graceful gesture toward the 


io8 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 


piled-up counter of periodicals near them. “An¬ 
other man work with me. He tell me one day 
two, t’ree days ago he saw young feller like young 
feller you speak about. But I don’ know no more 
nor that.” 

“Oh, where is he? Let me speak to him!” 
begged Dorothy frantically, but the young Latin 
made a gesture eloquent of resignation. 

“That feller seeck,” he said. “No come to 
work—must be seeck.” 

“But tell me his address. I will go to him,” 
cried Dorothy in a fever of impatience. 

Again the Italian shrugged resignedly. 

“No can do that either,” he answered regret¬ 
fully. “I don’ know where he live!” 


CHAPTER XV 


DISAPPOINTMENT 

Dorothy felt for a moment in the intensity of 
her disappointment that she could have shaken 
the smiling Italian. He could look so smug, so 
resigned, in the face of her own awful anxiety! 

This mood lasted for only a moment, however, 
for she remembered that the lad had at least 
tried to do her a favor. She even forced a smile 
to her lips as she thanked him for his meager 
information. 

u Have you any idea when this friend of yours 
will be back?” she heard herself asking in an 
unnaturally calm tone. 

Again the Italian shook his head helplessly, 
shrugged. 

“I don’ know—he don’ send no word. He be 
back mos’ any day, though,” he continued, bright¬ 
ening. “You stop around here again, eh? May¬ 
be get chance to see him then.” 

Dorothy nodded and, after thanking him again, 
continued wearily on her way. 

She and Tavia must wait around then for days 
perhaps until an unknown Italian recovered from 
109 


110 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 


some mysterious sickness—and this when every 
moment was precious! 

Even when this man returned to occupy his 
place behind the news stand what guarantee had 
she that the information he had to give was worth 
anything? 

Probably only another false clue, leading them 
to a dead wall. 

And meantime Joe was out in the great world 
somewhere, miserable and forlorn, almost cer¬ 
tainly at the end of his resources financially. 

She groaned and was conscious that one or two 
passersby turned to look at her curiously. At this 
she came to herself with a start and found that 
she had been wandering aimlessly outside the sta¬ 
tion—was in a section utterly strange to her. 

She would have felt a trifle panicky had she 
not remembered that taxicabs were plentiful and 
that one of them could be counted upon to take 
her safely to her destination. 

She hailed a cab and gave the name of her 
hotel. It was only a few minutes before she was 
back there, had paid the taxicab driver and was 
entering the crowded lobby. 

She was crossing swiftly toward the elevator 
when a familiar figure came within her line of 
vision and she saw that it was Tavia. A very 
much disgruntled Tavia, she saw at second glance. 

“Well, where have you been, Dorothy Dale?” 


DISAPPOINTMENT 


hi 


asked her chum, with asperity. “It seems that 
every time I turn my back you take that chance 
to run off and do something exciting.” 

“There was nothing exciting about my excursion 
this afternoon,” sighed Dorothy. “I spent a lot 
of time and trouble and found out—nothing, abso¬ 
lutely nothing.” 

* “Poor Doro,” sympathized Tavia, her manner 
suddenly changing to a more gentle one. “You 
do look done up. Let’s have some tea and you 
can tell me all about it.” 

“I should go and fix up a little,” protested 
Dorothy. “I must look a fright.” 

“You look as sweet as the proverbial summer 
rose,” Tavia reassured her. “Besides, I refuse 
to be cheated out of my tea. My gracious!” she 
exclaimed, stopping suddenly before one of the 
huge pillars in the lounge. “Look who’s here!” 

On her face was a peculiar expression and 
Dorothy followed with interest the direction of 
her gaze. Then she stiffened suddenly and her 
eyes began to blaze. 

Stanley Blake and Gibbons were crossing the 
lobby, and they were coming directly toward the 
two girls. 

“I don’t believe they have seen us,” whispered 
Tavia, who, for once, could see the wisdom of 
running away. “Can’t we slip off toward the ele¬ 
vators?” 


112 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 


“No, stay where you are!” Dorothy’s hand 
closed nervously on her arm. “They have seen 
us. And—listen Taviar—we must try to be nice 
to them.” 

If her chum had gone suddenly mad Tavia 
could not have looked any more startled. As a 
matter of fact, she feared for the moment that 
such was indeed the case. 

Dorothy advocating that they “be nice” to a 
couple of cheap tricksters who were even then 
conspiring against the success of the man she 
loved. Impossible! Incredible! 

But, impossible and incredible though it seemed, 
it was undoubtedly true. The two men had come 
up and addressed the girls with their most in¬ 
gratiating smiles. 

Dorothy, to Tavia’s intense wonder and dis¬ 
belief, coaxed an answering, and utterly adorable, 
smile to the corners of her mouth. 

She chatted with them for several minutes while 
Tavia gasped inwardly and attempted to hide her 
intense wonderment from the public gaze. 

It was an incredulous, much mystified Tavia, 
who faced her chum over the teacups a few min¬ 
utes later. 

“For goodness’ sake, Doro,” she cried, no 
longer to be restrained. “Have you taken com¬ 
plete leave of your wits?” 

“I hope not,” returned Dorothy, evidently en- 


DISAPPOINTMENT 


“3 

joying her chum’s bewilderment as she poured 
a cup of tea and sugared it liberally. “It even 
seems that I might, with more justice, ask that 
question of you.” 

“Well, if that isn’t adding insult to injury I’d 
like to know what Is!” cried Tavia indignantly. 
“For two cents I’d shake you soundly, Dorothy 
Dale, even if this is a public place.” 

“Don’t be foolish, Tavia.” 

Dorothy Dale leaned forward suddenly, her 
eyes intent upon her chum’s face. 

“I should think it would be easy for you to 
guess the reason of my apparent friendliness for 
those two scoundrels.” 

“Easy, old thing,” warned Tavia, looking about 
uneasily at the crowded tables. “’Tisn’t quite 
safe to call names in a crowded place. But go on 
with your explanation,” she urged. “I begin to 
see light!” 

“I wish I did,” sighed Dorothy. The momen¬ 
tary animation died out of her face and the old 
expression of anxiety returned. “I am being de¬ 
cent to those two men in the hope that I may 
find out something that will be of use to Garry. 
All’s fair in love and war, you see. And this 
certainly looks like war for Garry.” 

“Well, you are a great little conspirator!” cried 
Tavia admiringly. “This promises to be better 
than many mystery stories I have read. I can 


114 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

see where we don’t have a dull minute from 
now on.” 

“I wish I could share your optimism,” said 
Dorothy, and the extreme weariness of her voice 
prompted Tavia to ask again where she had been 
and what she had done that afternoon. 

Dorothy explained. Tavia was not in the least 
inclined to take her chum’s gloomy view of the 
situation. 

“I should think you would be tickled to death 
to have turned up any sort of clue, even a half 
dead one,” she said. “Cheer up, Doro, we’ll find 
out the truth at last. Unless,” she added, with a 
ghost of a chuckle, “our friend of the news stand 
dies of his mysterious ailment, when we may as¬ 
sume that our poor little clue dies with him.” 

“But meantime, while we are cooling our heels 
and waiting around for this Italian to turn up, 
what do you suppose will be happening to Joe?” 
cried Joe’s sister, with anguish in her eyes and 
voice. “I don’t think of it very much, for if 
I did I’m afraid I couldn’t go on.” 

“Well, you will go on to the end, Dorothy 
Dale. You always do. And I’ll be with you,” 
said Tavia cheerfully. “I will even go so far as 
to be nice to that villainous looking Gibbons, if 
you ask me to.” 

“That would be a test of friendship,” protested 
Dorothy, with a wan little smile. “I wouldn’t 


DISAPPOINTMENT 


II5 

ask it of you, Tavia dear. Now, if you are 
through, suppose we pay for this and go upstairs? 
I am very tired.” 

There was nothing more to do that day, but 
early on the following morning, refreshed by a 
delicious breakfast in the dining room, the two 
girls started for the railroad station. 

Dorothy had scant hope that her unknown in¬ 
formant would be present, but she could afford 
to overlook no possible chance. 

She was terribly nervous and on edge and once 
or twice Tavia scolded her sharply for it. A 
person in Dorothy’s condition could not be handled 
gently, Tavia knew, and again her treatment 
proved a tonic for her friend. 

Inside the station they hurried to the news 
stand and Dorothy’s heart beat wildly as she saw 
that her young Italian was not alone behind the 
counter. 

At that moment the boy saw Dorothy and 
Tavia and his eyes brightened. 

“I hope you come to-day,” he said to Dorothy 
“I have news for you, maybe.” 


CHAPTER XVI 


DOROTHY HOPES AGAIN 

Dorothy tried vainly to hold in check the 
wild hope that leaped within her. 

“What news?” she repeated as steadily as she 
could. Then she turned pleadingly to the strange 
man who stood behind the news stand. “Oh, if 
you have anything to tell me about my brother, 
please, please, do!” she cried. 

The man looked puzzled till the young Italian 
explained in his own tongue. Then his face 
brightened. 

“’Bout the boy you want to know, eh?” he 
asked in broken English. “I tell you all I know 
—but it is not very much.” 

“Yes?” pleaded Dorothy in an agony of im¬ 
patience. She had yet to learn that the Italian 
could not be hurried in his broken speech and 
that interruption only impeded his naturally slow 
progress. 

“He seem strange to me, dat boy,” he con¬ 
tinued, squinting his eyes in a dreamy fashion. 
“He did not act like a boy his age should act-” 



DOROTHY HOPES AGAIN 


ii 7 

“What was he like—this boy?” interrupted 
Dorothy again. 

Her informant regarded her in pained surprise 
and, after some difficulty and more interpretation 
by his young countryman, he made out the mean¬ 
ing of her question. 

Then, in his maddeningly deliberate way, he 
described the lad who had caught his interest— 
described him down to the very suit of clothes 
he had been wearing. Dorothy’s excitement and 
impatience increased almost past bearing as she 
realized that this lad could have been none other 
than her beloved runaway brother. 

“Don’t hurry him, Doro,” whispered Tavia in 
her ear, as excited as Dorothy herself. “Can’t 
you see it only confuses him? Let him tell it his 
own way.” 

Dorothy nodded and leaned eagerly across the 
counter toward her informant. 

“Did he—did you—speak to this boy?” 

The face of the man lit up and he nodded 
eagerly. 

“I feel sorry for him,” he explained. “He look 
so scared and—lonesome.” 

A little sob broke from Dorothy but she im¬ 
mediately checked it. 

“Oh, go on, please go on!” she begged. “What 
did you say to him?” 

“I ask him if he is all alone,” the Italian 


118 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 


responded, more readily than he had yet done. 
“He say, yes, all alone an’ he want to go to 
Desert City.” 

The two girls started and stared at each other. 

“What did I tell you?” cried Dorothy radi¬ 
antly, then immediately turned back to the man. 
“What did he do then? Please tell me quickly,” 
she begged. 

“I tol’ him nearest station to Desert City, 
Dugonne,” he paused and regarded the girls 
beamingly as though proud of his knowledge, and 
in spite of Tavia’s warning pressure on her arm 
Dorothy could not stand the delay. 

“Of course we know that,” she said. “Please 
go on!” 

“He say he no have money to buy ticket-” 

Tavia gave a little exclamation of pity and 
this time it was Dorothy who held up her hand 
for silence. 

“I say I lend him ten cents-” 

“Ten cents!” repeated Tavia hysterically. “But 
ten cents wouldn’t take him ten miles-” 

“But he have all the rest himself,” explained 
the Italian, with the air of one who has told 
the answer to a clever riddle. “All he need more 
than he got, ten cents. I give him.” 

“It was more than kind of you,” cried Dorothy 
gratefully. “I can give you the ten cents, but I 
can never repay your kindness.” 





DOROTHY HOPES AGAIN 


119 

With the words she got out her purse and 
from it took some money which she extended to¬ 
ward Joe’s benefactor. He seemed reluctant at 
first to take it, but, upon Dorothy’s insistence, 
overcame his scruples. 

They had turned away after repeated expres¬ 
sions of thanks when suddenly Dorothy broke 
away from Tavia and ran back again. 

“There is just one more thing I should like to 
ask you,” she said breathlessly. “Do you know 
whether my brother actually bought a ticket to 
Dugonne as he intended to?” 

The Italian shook his head and shrugged his 
shoulders in that exaggerated gesture of regret. 

“I cannot tell, Miss. He went off in the crowd. 
I never see him again.” 

So Dorothy had to be content with the infor¬ 
mation she had. As a matter of fact, she was 
more than satisfied. She was jubilant. 

Not only had her suspicions concerning Joe’s 
intention proved correct, but now she had some 
definite clue to work on. No more suspense, no 
more delay. They would take the very next train 
to Dugonne. 

Dorothy’s heart bounded with relief—and an¬ 
other feeling. For at Desert City she would see 
Garry again. And it would be good to see Garry! 

“Well, you have gone and done it this time,” 
Tavia greeted her jubilantly. “I am here to tell 


120 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 


the world you are some sleuth, Dorothy Dale. 
You certainly have brought home the bacon.” 

“Tavia, such slang!” cried Dorothy, but she 
almost sang the words. “I wish you could sing 
my praises in more ladylike terms.” 

“You should worry as long as they get sung!” 
retorted the light-hearted Tavia. “I suppose Du- 
gonne is our next stop,” she added, looking at 
Dorothy with dancing eyes. 

“The Blenheim,” corrected Dorothy, with a 
shake of her head. “We must at least take time 
to get our grips and pay the hotel bill.” 

“Thus is adventure always spoiled by such sor¬ 
did things,” sighed Tavia. “But if we must we 
must.” 

Upon reaching the hotel they checked out im¬ 
mediately and, by consulting a time-table, found 
that they could get a train for Dugonne in half 
an hour. 

“Here’s luck,” said Tavia. “No painful wait¬ 
ing around while you wonder what to do.” 

“We do seem to be running in luck to-day,” 
replied Dorothy. “I have an absurd desire to 
knock wood every few minutes for fear it will 
desert us,” she admitted. 

“The wood?” giggled Tavia. 

“The luck, you silly,” retorted Dorothy, ad¬ 
ding with a significant glance at Tavia’s head 


DOROTHY HOPES AGAIN 121 

under the saucy small hat: “And I wouldn’t have 
to look very far for the wood at that!” 

“You can be cruel when you wish, Doro. 
Though no one would guess it to look at you.” 

The train started on time and they found to 
their further joy that it was possible even at 
this last moment to engage berths in the Pullman. 

They found themselves comfortably settled, 
their baggage stowed away, and the train on its 
way in a miraculously short time. 

“Thank goodness we managed to avoid saying 
a fond farewell to your friend Stanley Blake and 
his companion.” 

“My friend, indeed!” Dorothy retorted indig¬ 
nantly. “I’d like to know how you get that way, 
Tavia Travers!” 

“Such terrible slang,” murmured Tavia in¬ 
corrigibly. 

“Who was it, I would like to know, who en¬ 
couraged those two, anyway—I mean at first?” 

“Well, you ought to be grateful to me,” re¬ 
turned Tavia, opening her big eyes. “If I hadn’t 
encouraged them, as you call it, we might never 
have found out their deep dark secret. Then 
where would your precious Garry be, I’d like to 
know?” 

Dorothy threw up her hands and gave in. 

“No use. You are absolutely hopeless,” she 
cried, and Tavia grinned wickedly. 


122 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 


“Have some candy?” she asked, extending the 
box she had been thoughtful enough to buy at 
the station, hoping thus to change the subject. 
And she was successful, for who can find fault 
with a person when benefiting by her generosity? 

“I feel as though I should have sent a telegram 
to Garry, warning him of Joe’s descent upon him,” 
Dorothy said, after awhile. “It would be rather 
a shock if Joe walked in on him unannounced.” 

“But then if Joe doesn’t appear per schedule 
Garry would be worried and so w^ould you,” 
Tavia pointed out. “No, Doro dear, I think you 
have done wisely to let well enough alone. It 
seems to me we have done all we can do for the 
present.” 

Almost before they knew it came the second 
call for lunch, and the girls rose to go to the 
dining car. 

They had to pass through several cars to reach 
the diner, and at the next to the last Tavia stopped 
short, almost upsetting Dorothy, who followed 
close behind her. 

“Dorothy!” she said in a queer voice. “Do 
you see what I see?” 


CHAPTER XVII 


SOME RASCALS REAPPEAR 

Dorothy's eyes followed the direction of 
Tavia’s momentarily petrified stare and she sud¬ 
denly and sharply drew in her breath. There 
seated side by side with their heads close together 
were Stanley Blake and the small black-eyed man 
whom he had called Gibbons. 

Dorothy felt extremely uncomfortable, but she 
retained her presence of mind sufficiently to urge 
Tavia to go on as quickly as possible. 

Tavia was quick to take the hint and, pre¬ 
tending they did not see the two men and hoping 
that the latter would not notice them, they hurried 
by. With relief they found themselves a moment 
later safe and unrecognized in the dining car. 

There was a short line of passengers awaiting 
admission to the tables and Dorothy was greatly 
relieved when she and Tavia were finally beckoned 
to places at the front of the car. 

Facing each other across the table, their eyes 
spoke volumes but their tongues were tied by the 
fact that they were not alone at the table, at 

133 


fi24 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

which were already eating two men in loud, 
checked suits and flashy neckties. 

Dorothy, facing the door of the dining car, 
watched it constantly in apprehension lest the 
two men appear. Tavia, watching the direction 
of her glance, understood her thought and spoke 
reassuringly. 

“I don’t imagine there is any danger of meet¬ 
ing them here now, Doro,” she said. “You re¬ 
member they were always the first in the dining 
car on the way out and probably their habits 
haven’t changed much since then.” 

Dorothy nodded. 

“Lucky for us we waited until the second call,” 
she said. 

After that they spoke only of trivial things until 
the two men at their table, traveling salesmen, 
by their conversation, got up and lumbered fatly 
off. 

Tavia found herself wondering with an inward 
chuckle why men who indulged a passion for 
checked suits almost invariably were fat. 

An anxious question from Dorothy brought her 
back to consideration of the immediate problem 
confronting them. 

“Do you think they are going to Desert City?” 
asked Dorothy in a voice so low it could hardly 
be heard above the pounding of the train. 

“I shouldn’t wonder if that were their des- 


SOME RASCALS REAPPEAR 125 

tination, Doro mia,” agreed Tavia reluctantly. 
“Having mentioned Garry’s ranch and being now 
bound in the general direction of Colorado and 
Desert City, it seems only fair to assume that their 
destination is more or less identical with ours.” 

“If I could only find out what they are up to!” 
cried Dorothy, adding, as her pretty mouth set 
itself firmly: “And I intend to find out, too, before 
I get through with those rascals.” 

“I have a shorter and uglier word for them,” 
said Tavia. Then she leaned across the table 
toward her chum and asked with interest: “This 
begins to sound thrilling, Doro, do you mind 
telling an old friend—if not a trusted one—when 
and how you intend to start in the business of 
mind reading?” 

“I am sure I don’t know!” admitted Dorothy, 
as she stared absently at her practically untouched 
plate. “It is one thing to determine on an action 
and quite another to carry it out.” 

“There speaks great wisdom,” gibed Tavia, ill 
good-natured raillery, adding with genuine con¬ 
cern as her eyes also focused upon Dorothy’s 
plate of untouched food: “But why don’t you 
eat, Doro? One must, you know, to live-” 

Quite suddenly Dorothy’s eyes filled with tears! 
and her lip quivered. Tavia looked astonished 
and alarmed. 


126 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 


“Now what have I done?” she cried. “If I 
said anyhing--” 

“Oh, it isn’t you,” Dorothy interrupted. “I 
was thinking of Joe.” She stared across at her 
chum with tragic eyes. “Tavia, have you stopped 
to think how Joe is going to—to—eat?” 

“Why, with his mouth I —” Tavia began in 
her usual flippant tone, then stopped short, star¬ 
ing at her chum. 

“One doesn’t eat these days unless he pays for 
what he gets,” said Dorothy bitterly. 

“And Joe spent his last cent for railroad fare,” 
Tavia said, in a small voice. 

“Exactly,” retorted Dorothy. She gave a com¬ 
prehensive sweep of her hand toward the tempt¬ 
ing contents of her plate. “Then with that 
thought in mind, do you wonder that food chokes 
me?” 

“Poor Doro!” said Tavia softly. “You surely 
have more than your share of trouble just now. 
But you had better eat, dear,” she added very 
gently. “It won’t do Joe any good for you to 
starve yourself, you know. You are going to need 
all your strength for the business of finding the 
poor foolish lad.” 

Dorothy, practical and sensible as always, saw 
the wisdom of this and forced down about half 
of her lunch and hastily swallowed a glass of 
milk. 



SOME RASCALS REAPPEAR 12 % 

“I hate to go through that car again,” she con¬ 
fided to her chum, when there was no further 
excuse for lingering. 

“So do I,” confessed Tavia. “However, I 
think the waiter is of a mercenary turn of mind. 
He hovereth over the check like a hungry hawk.” 

“Your description is picturesque, if a trifle 
strained,” murmured Dorothy, as she motioned to 
the waiter and took out her pocketbook. “Your 
imagination does terrible things to you, Tavia.” 

But in her heart she was mutely grateful that 
Tavia had been created as she was with an un¬ 
quenchable sense of humor and scant reverence 
for solemn things. To her, trouble was merely a 
cloud before the sun that would presently pass 
and leave the day brighter than ever. And one 
had the feeling that if the sun did not come out 
quickly enough to suit her, Tavia would find ai 
way to hurry it! 

On the way through their car Tavia was quick 
to notice that Dorothy made no attempt to avoid 
the gaze of the two men; in fact, seemed rather 
to court it. Tavia had a moment of intense ad¬ 
miration for her chum’s ability as an actress. 
She would never have suspected it of Dorothy, 
the sensible, practical and straightforward. 

The handsome eyes of Stanley Blake discovered 
them immediately and he rose with what should 
have been flattering alacrity. 


128 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 


Tavia noticed that his pleasure was for Doro¬ 
thy and knew what she had suspected from the 
beginning, that her chum had been the real object 
of his admiration. 

Gibbons did not seem quite so pleased to see 
them. Tavia noticed that his eyes had narrowed 
in a surly and suspicious manner. 

Dorothy answered quite sweetly and pleas¬ 
antly Blake’s interested questions concerning the 
number of their reservation, and after a moment 
of light and amiable conversation, the two girls 
passed on, leaving the men to stare after them, 
one with admiration, the other with suspicion. 

“Well, now you’ve gone and done it,” said 
Tavia, looking at her chum with dancing eyes 
when they regained their seat. “You couldn’t 
possibly snub our gay fellow travelers after that 
lusciously friendly greeting.” 

“I don’t want to—just yet,” returned Dorothy 
significantly. 

At the next station the train stopped for a few 
minutes to take on coal and water and Dorothy 
took this opportunity to send a second telegram 
to Garry. 

In this she told him of the presence of the 
two men on the same train with her and Tavia 
and their probable destination. 

She told him also of her anxiety concerning 
Joe and begged him to watch out for the lad, 


SOME RASCALS REAPPEAR 


129 

saying that he had undoubtedly gone out to join 
him, Garry, at Desert City by way of Dugonne. 

Somehow, after sending this telegram, she felt 
easier in her mind concerning Joe. Provided that 
the lad reached Dugonne in safety Garry could 
be depended upon to keep him in safety until she 
could get to him. 

As the train moved on again, Tavia settled 
back in her seat contentedly and regarded the 
flying landscape with dreamy anticipation. 

In her own mind Tavia had decided that Joe 
was either already safe with Garry or soon would 
be, and she was preparing to enjoy the rest of 
the trip. 

“It will be great to see Desert City and a 
ranch again,” she said, putting some of her 
thoughts into words for Dorothy’s benefit. “I 
wonder if it will all look the same as it did when 
we left it, Doro.” 

“A great deal better, probably,” said Dorothy, 
rousing herself from a troubled reverie. “With 
Lost River to solve the irrigation problem all the 
ranchland in the vicinity of our ranch and Garry’s 
•should have benefited a great deal. I shouldn’t 
wonder if we should see some wonderful changes, 
Tavia.” 

“I reckon that mining gang were sore when 
they couldn’t get Lost River for their own 


1 3 o DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

schemes,” chuckled Tavia. “Do you remember 
Philo Marsh?” 

“Do I remember him!” repeated Dorothy, with 
a shiver. “You might better ask me if I can ever 
forget him!” 

“Oh, well, he wasn’t so bad,” said Tavia, still 
chuckling. “He certainly kept our vacation from 
being a dull one.” 

The girls were recalling incidents of their first 
memorable trip to Desert City and the Hardin 
ranch. The ranch had been willed jointly to 
Major Dale and Dorothy’s Aunt Winnie White 
by Colonel Hardin, an old friend of the Major’s. 

It had been Colonel Hardin’s wish that Lost 
River, a stream which had its origin on the Hardin 
ranch and which, after flowing for a short dis¬ 
tance above ground, disappeared abruptly into 
the earth and continued for some distance under¬ 
ground, be diverted for the good of the farm- and 
ranchlands in the vicinity. 

An influential group of miners represented 
secretly by a lawyer of shady reputation, the Philo 
Marsh spoken of by Tavia, had nursed quite 
different plans in connection with Lost River. 
They needed the stream in their mining operations 
and were determined to get it. 

The Major and Mrs. White, however, were 
quite as determined to act according to the wishes 
of Colonel Hardin. They successfully combated 


SOME RASCALS REAPPEAR 131 

more than one attempt by the mine owners to 
get possession of the river, but it remained for 
the young folks, Dorothy, Tavia and the two 
White boys and a young Mexican girl on the 
ranch, to outwit the final plot of the unscrupulous 
men. 

Lost River had consequently gone to the ranch- 
lands in the vicinity as Colonel Hardin had wished 
and there had followed a period of rare content¬ 
ment and prosperity for the farmers. 

Garry Knapp’s land adjoined the Hardin estate 
and had been left to the'young Westerner by the 
will of his uncle, Terry Knapp. 

The latter was an irascible, though kind- 
hearted, old fellow who had quarreled with his 
nephew on a point of ethics and had promptly 
disinherited him. Consequently, Garry was very 
much surprised and affected to find that his Uncle 
Terry had repented of his harshness and on his 
death bed had left the old Knapp ranch to him. 

Naturally, Garry had benefited, as had his 
neighbors, by the diversion of Lost River and 
there had seemed until lately nothing in the path 
of his ambition to raise the finest wheat crop in 
all that productive country. 

Of course Garry had had enemies, Dorothy 
knew that. There were those who envied him his 
good fortune and who would willingly have taken 
the Knapp ranch away from him. 


132 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

With the help of Bob Douglas, Terry’s fore¬ 
man while he lived and now as devotedly Garry’s, 
the young ranchman had been able to laugh at 
these attempts. 

But now it looked to Dorothy as though some¬ 
thing more serious than ever was afoot to rob 
Garry of the fruits of victory, and she was 
anxious. 

“Wake up, Doro darling,” she heard Tavia 
hiss excitedly. “The villains approach. Now is 
your opportunity to prove yourself a great melo¬ 
dramatic actress if not worse.” 


CHAPTER XVIII 

PLAYING A PART 

Dorothy braced up mentally and prepared for 
the encounter. 

Stanley Blake was coming toward them down 
the aisle with Gibbons following close at his heels 
like a squat little tug in the wake of a graceful 
steamboat. 

Tavia’s eyes danced as she watched them. She 
was evidently prepared to enjoy herself thor¬ 
oughly. To see her outspoken Dorothy Dale 
play a part was a novelty and a most amusing 
one. 

“Like going to a play, only lots better,” was 
her unspoken thought. “For this, Tavia Travers, 
is real drama. True to life, if not truer.” 

But Dorothy was in quite a different mood. It 
was hard for her to act a part and she hated it. 
If she were forced to do such a thing for any 
one but Garry- 

She closed here eyes for a moment and thought 
hard of Garry. When she opened them she 
looked straight into the handsome eyes of “Cal,” 
alias Stanley Blake, and smiled sweetly. 

133 



i 3 4 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

The latter was armed with two huge candy 
boxes and Dorothy accepted one of these while 
she longed to throw it to the floor. She decided 
hastily that she would get rid of it as soon as the 
men had returned to their own car. 

It was easy to see that Tavia had no such 
scruples. She had already untied the violet rib¬ 
bon that surrounded a box of an equally violet— 
Tavia afterwards pronounced it “violent”—hue, 
and, with smiling hospitality, was passing it 
around. 

They talked for a while about impersonal 
things until Dorothy managed deftly and with 
apparent inadvertence to insert the information 
that she and her chum were bound for Desert 
City. 

Stanley Blake immediately showed great pleas¬ 
ure, imparting the information that, by a strange 
coincidence, his destination also was Desert City. 

It was the unpleasant-faced Gibbons that in¬ 
quired with apparent guilelessness whether they 
had friends at Desert City, and it was here also 
that Dorothy displayed tact and discretion. 

She responded with the truth about her pursuit 
of Joe and went into details with such candor— 
as, indeed, why should she not, seeing that she 
was telling the truth, even if it was not all the 
truth ?—that even the inclined-to-be-skeptical 
Gibbons seemed impressed. 


PLAYING A PART 


135 

It ended in their assuring her of their personal 
aid in the search for her lost brother. Dorothy 
thanked them and in a few minutes they took their 
leave, Blake being fairly dragged along by the 
insistent Gibbons. 

Tavia guessed that the mind of the last-named 
gentleman was concentrated upon the dining car 
from which could momentarily be expected the 
first call to dinner, and in this guess she came 
very near the truth. 

“Well done, Doro!” Tavia exclaimed as her 
chum leaned back wearily in a corner of her seat. 
“You pulled the wool over their eyes with rare 
skill. The next thing you know our handsome 
Cal will be baring his secret thoughts to you.” 

“Not while that other fellow, Gibbons, is 
around,” said Dorothy ruefully. “He hasn’t much 
brains, but he has more than Stanley Blake, or 
whatever his real name is. Didn’t you notice 
once or twice how Gibbons caught Blake up when 
he was about to divulge some secret?” 

“Did I notice?” repeated Tavia reproachfully. 
“My dear, do you think I was born yesterday? 
And now,” she added gleefully, “you have given 
me an inkling why I was thrust into this cruel 
world, Doro Dale. I believe I was born for this 
moment!” 

“Don’t be ridiculous!” 

“Impossible to avoid it, my dear,” retorted 


136 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

Tavia. “Now listen while I unfold to you my 
part in this drama.” 

And so it came to pass that an ugly-faced indi¬ 
vidual named Gibbons came to the conclusion 
that he was irresistible to the fair sex, or at least 
to one representative member of it named Tavia 
Travers. 

He was bewildered and fascinated, albeit still 
faintly suspicious. But his vanity was touched, 
and that is fatal to a man—especially to a man 
of the Gibbons stamp. Before they arrived at 
Dugonne the next day he was completely enslaved 
and suspicion had been almost completely lulled 
to rest. 

As Tavia herself later confided to Dorothy, 
she had seldom, if ever, worked so hard in her 
life, for Gibbons was not the type of man a girl 
naturally takes to, especially a girl of discrimina¬ 
tion like Tavia. 

“Now, your part was the easy one,” she added, 
at which Dorothy looked at her pityingly. 

“If you think so, you should have tried it!” 
was all she said. However, the fact remains that, 
in spite of all their efforts, the girls found out 
very little concerning the plot involving Garry 
at which in the hotel dining room these men had 
hinted. 

Dorothy, though spending many hours in the 
society of Stanley Blake, never dared to lead 


PLAYING A PART 


137 


directly up to the subject and the man avoided all 
reference to his present business in Desert City 
with a skill that was baffling. 

Only once under the stimulus of a good meal 
and Dorothy’s smiles did he become talkative. 

“There are some young fellows out here in 
the West who expect to make a fortune when they 
really haven’t got the least idea how to go about 
it,” he began, and paused, looking over at 
Dorothy. 

The girl said nothing, but evidently he found 
her silence encouraging for his mood became more 
expansive as he warmed up to his discourse. 

“They expect to strike gold the first thing, or 
raise a spanking crop of wheat without having, 
you might say, a bit of experience. Serves their 
conceit right when some of them get left.” 

“Do many of them get left?” asked Dorothy 
softly, hoping that her face expressed the right 
degree of indifference. 

“A right smart lot of them do, I reckon,” he 
responded, with a chuckle. “I know one young 
fellow right now who’s due for a large, hard fall 
if he don’t keep his eyes pretty spry about him.” 

Dorothy started nervously and covered her 
slip by reaching for a chocolate from Tavia’s 
candy box. Tavia, by the way, was at that 
moment sparkling for the benefit of a bewildered 


138 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

but appreciative Gibbons on the observation 
platform. 

Dorothy hoped Tavia would continue to 
sparkle for a few moments more. She felt that 
she was on the verge of a real discovery. 

So she asked, disguising her eagerness behind 
a yawn of apparently complete boredom: 

“Is this young fellow you speak of a miner or 
is he trying to get rich raising wheat?” 

“Trying! Trying is right!” snorted the other, 
and Dorothy surprised an extremely ugly look in 
his eyes. “Why, he isn’t sure he even owns the 
land for his wheat to grow on!” 

“The title not clear?” asked the girl, in a quiet 
voice. 

“Sometimes titles have flaws in ’em, sometimes 
it’s old men’s wills that are not clear,” answered 
the fellow absently. 

Dorothy uttered a startled exclamation and 
the man glanced at her swiftly. Perhaps it was 
the look in her eyes or some latent stirrings of 
caution, but at any rate he changed the subject, 
speaking aimlessly of the weather. 

“Looks like we are running into a rain storm,” 
he remarked, adding, idly: “Good thing for 
wheat, anyway.” 

Dorothy knew that there was no chance of 
learning anything further concerning Garry and, 


PLAYING A PART 


139 


as they were rapidly reaching Dugonne, the near¬ 
est station to the Hardin ranch, she felt that her 
opportunity was almost at an end. 

At any rate, she had found out one thing. 

“I wonder,” she thought wearily as Blake left 
her and sauntered in the direction of the smoking 
car, “if there can be any truth in what he hinted. 
But of course there can’t be. Garry ought to 
know whether he owns his ranch or not. Oh, 
how I hate that Stanley Blake!” 


CHAPTER XIX 


AN OLD FRIEND 

Later Dorothy related the details of this 
conversation to Tavia, and even that sanguine 
one could find little of use in it. 

“It seems to leave us just about where we were 
before,” she commented. “Never mind, honey, 
we shall soon be in Desert City, and, once on the 
ground, I reckon we’ll find ourselves in possession 
of more unpleasant facts than we need or want.” 

“How comforting you are,” complained Doro¬ 
thy, as she turned restlessly in the velvet-covered 
seat. “I am horribly nervous, Tavia. Suppose 
Joe hasn’t reached Desert City! Suppose he took 
the wrong train or something! So many things 
may happen to a boy traveling all alone. Remem¬ 
ber, he didn’t even have money to buy himself 
food!” 

“Now you stop worrying, Doro Doodlekins.” 
Tavia’s arms had circled her chum in a comfort¬ 
ing embrace. “If that telegram has reached 
Garry, as of course it has, I’ll guarantee he has 
Joe as safe as a bug in a rug by this time.” 

A little sound broke from Dorothy that was 

140 


AN OLD FRIEND 


141 

more sob than laugh, but she tried to turn it 
into a laugh as she answered Tavia’s reassurance 
with a wistful: 

“That does sound wonderful, Tavia. If it is 
only true!” 

“Of course it’s true. Did you ever know me to 
tell a fib?” retorted Tavia, and wished in her 
heart that she was as certain as her words sounded. 

Then came their arrival at Dugonne and the 
embarrassment and indecision of the two girls as 
to just how they were to get rid of their two 
acquaintances now that they had reached their 
destination. 

“I imagine we won’t have to worry about it 
much,” Dorothy remarked shrewdly. “When 
they find that our destination is the Hardin ranch 
and that I am engaged to Garry Knapp whose 
property adjoins the Hardin ranch, they probably 
will keep their distance from us.” 

“That’s all right after they learn,” assented 
Tavia. “What I was worrying about was the 
meantime.” 

As it happened, they were spared the embar¬ 
rassment of sending Blake and Gibbons about 
their business by the sudden and unexpected ap¬ 
pearance at the station of an old friend of theirs, 
or rather, of Tavia’s. 

The girls had descended to the platform hoping 
that, since Blake and Gibbons were almost at 


142 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

the other end of the train, they would be able to 
get away before the men came up to them. 

Dorothy searched with eager eyes the faces of 
those who had gathered to meet the train, expect¬ 
ing confidently to see Garry. 

yad she not wired him of her impending 
arrival and of the very time of her arrival? And 
of course Garry would be there, eagerly looking 
for her, as she was for him. 

But Garry was not there. Dorothy realized 
this with incredulity. Garry was not there! 

Then suddenly her incredulity was engulfed by 
a terrible apprehension. If Garry was not there, 
there could be only one reason. Garry could not 
come! Something had happened to him! 

“Well, that young Knapp fellow seems to be 
conspicuous by his absence,” Tavia observed flip¬ 
pantly. “Guess we’d better get a bus, Doro, and 
ride up to the Hardin ranch in style. Horrors, 
here come those awful men!” 

Dorothy gave a quick glance up the platform 
and saw that Blake and Gibbons were bearing 
rapidly down upon them. Something must be 
done right away. They couldn’t stand there gap¬ 
ing like Eastern “tenderfoots.” 

It was at this critical moment that Tavia dis¬ 
covered her old friend. 

“Lance! Lance Petterby!” she called, literally 
dragging Dorothy along by the hand to the far 


AN OLD FRIEND 


143 


end of the station where stood a dilapidated Ford 
car. ‘‘Well, if this isn’t the greatest luck ever!” 

The broad-hatted young fellow behind the 
wheel of the battered car looked bewildered for a 
moment. Then he smiled broadly and, with a 
sweeping gesture, removed his sombrero. 

The next moment he had leaped to the ground, 
his tanned, good-looking face alight with smiles. 

“Well, if it ain’t Miss Tavia and Miss Doro¬ 
thy!” he cried. “Jerusha Juniper, but it’s good 
to see you both!” 

The familiar exclamation brought a smile from 
both the girls, for it was the phrase with which 
Lance greeted every emergency of his life. 

“What can I do for you?” asked Lance, as he 
looked about at the fast-dimiriishing throng 
around the station. “No one to meet you, eh?” 
He was surprised, for he had heard of Garry 
Knapp’s engagement to Dorothy. 

“Not a soul,” agreed Tavia. Lance stepped 
aside and she saw with embarrassment that he 
was not alone in his ancient equipage. “Oh,” she 
cried, “we didn’t know you had any one with you.” 

“ ’Tain’t no one, only my wife,” said Lance, 
with a fond possessive smile. “Ladies, meet Mrs. 
Petterby, and a finer, prettier wife you wouldn’t 
meet nowheres.” 

The plump young person thus described smiled 
genially and the girls saw that she was very pretty 


144 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

indeed and of the type generally described as 
“wholesome.” 

“Lance is always ridiculous, but most so when 
describin’ me,” she said, in a pleasant drawl. “Do 
be still, Octavia Susan!” 

Tavia started, and was very much taken aback 
until she saw that this remark was not addressed 
to her but to the small infant in the arms of Susan 
Petterby. 

Lance immediately captured the infant, bring¬ 
ing it forward for closer inspection by the laugh¬ 
ing girls. 

“Octavia Susan Petterby was a pretty little 
thing, resembling closely her blue-eyed, rosy- 
cheeked mother. 

“My godchild!” exclaimed Tavia dramatically. 
She stretched out her arms, intending to clasp the 
baby in a warm embrace, that seeming the right 
and proper thing to do with one’s godchild. But 
she got no further than the gesture, for Octavia 
Susan suddenly shut her eyes and opened her 
mouth and let out a wail that would have daunted 
a more phlegmatic person that Tavia. 

Even Lance seemed to be slightly apprehensive, 
for he restored the infant to its mother’s arms 
with marked alacrity. 

“She doesn’t like me!” cried Tavia, in mock 
chagrin, adding, with a chuckle: “I don’t believe 
she even knows Pm her godmother.” 


AN OLD FRIEND 


145 

“There’s a heap she’s got to learn yet, Miss 
Tavia,” Lance agreed, with a grin. “And prob¬ 
ably that’s one of them. But say, Miss Dale,” 
he added, turning to Dorothy, “I suppose you are 
hankerin’ to get out to the Hardin ranch. If 
you don’t mind hittin’ the high spots in the old 
flivver, me and the wife will have you out there in 
a jiffy. Funny nobody came to meet you,” he 
added, as the girls accepted with thanks and 
climbed into the tonneau of the car. 

The reiteration irritated Dorothy and she was 
about to reply rather sharply when she thought 
suddenly of the two men, Blake and Gibbons, 
who had been hurrying to meet them when Tavia 
spied Lance Petterby and his car. 

Her quick glance scanned the platform, but 
she saw they had gone. Seeing her and Tavia 
with Lance, they had probably thought it advis¬ 
able to go away quickly. 

“By the way, Miss Dale,” Lance asked in his 
drawling tones, “I meant to ask you when I first 
saw you. Was you lookin’ for your brother Joe ?” 


CHAPTER XX 


REAL NEWS AT LAST 

“Was you lookin’ for your brother Joe?” 

For the moment the casualness of that question 
robbed Dorothy of her power of speech. It was 
Tavia who answered for her. 

“Looking for him!” she repeated. “I should 
say we were! Half across the continent, and no 
luck yet.” 

“Have you seen him, Lance?” Dorothy’s voice 
was breathless and pleading and Lance had turned 
in his seat to look at her as he drove the Ford 
over the bumpy road. 

“I certainly did! And he wasn’t keepin’ no 
good company, either.” There was hearty dis¬ 
approval in the last part of this observation, but 
Dorothy was too interested in the first part to 
notice. 

“Did he look well, Lance?” she cried. 

“Well, as to that, I can’t hardly say,” returned 
the cowboy, with maddening deliberation. “Seein’ 
as I didn’t see him ’cept in passin’, as you might 
say.” 

“Where was he going?” cried Dorothy, almost 

146 


REAL NEWS AT LAST 147 

frantic with suspense. “At least you can tell me 
that, can’t you?” 

“Don’t be so slow and palaverin’,” Susan Pet- 
terby adjured her husband. “You can be the most 
aggravatin’ person when you wants to, Lance 
Petterby. Takin’ so long to think and puttin’ a 
body off so. Can’t you see the young lady is 
worried nigh to death?” 

“Guess that’s so, though you’re always the one 
for seein’ things, Sue,” said Lance penitently. 
“Your brother Joe was going to Garry Knapp’s 
ranch when I saw him, Miss Dale.” 

“Oh, then everything is all right,” cried Doro¬ 
thy, with a great sigh of relief. “Once he gets 
to Garry all my worries will be over.” 

“Yes, if we was only sure he got where he was 
goin’,” said Lance gloomily, adding hastily in 
response to his wife’s sharp nudge in the ribs: 
“Though it’s more than likely he got there all 
right, anyway.” 

In spite of his clumsy attempt to cover a slip 
of the tongue, the mischief had been done. Fear 
leaped into Dorothy’s heart again as she said 
quietly: 

“Please tell me what you meant by that, Lance. 
Please don’t try to keep anything from me.” 

“Well,” complied Lance reluctantly, always 
keeping an eye on his plump and pretty wife, “I 
sure don’t mean to scare you, Miss Dorothy, be- 


148 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

cause, as I said before, everything is probably all 
right. But the lad was in company with a fellow 
that ain’t no friend of Garry’s, nor yet of any 
decent man’s in these parts. You may be sure I 
didn’t trust him, and when I heard who the lad 
was I did my best to get him to go with me.” 

“And he wouldn’t?” interposed Dorothy 
swiftly and in surprise. 

Lance shook his head. 

“Larrimer—that’s the man he was with— 
didn’t give him much chance. Whisked him off 
almost before I had finished speakin’. Ain’t got 
no manners, that guy ain’t.” He chuckled reminis¬ 
cently, but Dorothy was very far from seeing 
any joke in what he had said. 

“But I don’t understand, Lance,” she said, 
bewildered. “Why was my brother—why was 
Joe in the company of this man?” 

“Picked him up, probably, Miss Dale,” re¬ 
turned Lance, his voice softening to a tone of 
sympathy. “The boy was probably hungry-” 

“Probably he was!” Dorothy interrupted, with 
a half sob. 

“When I first saw them they was cornin’ out of 
Hicks’ chop house and the lad was wipin’ his 
mouth on his handkerchief. After that your 
brother Joe probably thought Larrimer was a 
mighty slick feller—which he is,” the cowboy 
added, with another of his slow chuckles. 



REAL NEWS AT LAST 


149 


“Who is Larrimer, if you don’t mind relieving 
our curiosity?” asked Tavia who, up to this time, 
had been too interested in the conversation to 
join it. “You needn’t keep all your jokes to your¬ 
self, Lance.” 

“He ain’t no joke, Larrimer ain’t,” retorted 
Lance, suddenly grim. “He’s the meanest guy 
that ever busted an honest broncho. Yes, ma’am, 
Larrimer is worse than the plague, him and his 
swell pals, Stiffbold and Lightly.” 

“Stiffbold and Lightly,” repeated Dorothy 
thoughtfully, then added, with another swift rush 
of apprehension. “Oh, those are the two men 
who have been making so much trouble for Garry. 
After his land—and everything.” 

“You said it, Miss Dale. His land and every¬ 
thing,” returned Lance, his tone still grim. “First 
they was all for tryin’ to prove that Garry ain’t 
got no land—which was about the same as tellin’ 
Garry he ain’t been born. Then, when all the 
law sharpers they got on their string couldn’t 
prove nothin’ to nobody’s satisfaction—’ceptin’ 
maybe Larrimer’s—they tried drivin’ Garry to 
sell.” 

“Oh!” gasped Dorothy. “As if he would!” 

“That’s just it, Miss Dale,” agreed Lance 
Petterby approvingly. “Garry would just as 
likely sell his right arm off’n him as to part with 
any of his land. And after that they tried differ- 


150 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

ent tactics, and I must say for them that they’ve 
been pretty thorough—haven’t left one little 
stone unturned, as you might say.” 

Susan Petterby again nudged her husband as 
though to tell him he had gone far enough. But 
Dorothy’s insistence was not to be denied. 

“What did they do, Lance? Please tell me. 
I will find out from Garry, anyway, when I see 
him. So you might as well.” 

“Well, I ain’t no diplomat,” said Lance rue¬ 
fully. “What with Sue here cavin’ in my ribs 
every time I open my mouth and with Miss Dale 

clamorin’ for information-” 

“Please let him tell me, Mrs. Petterby,” coaxed 
Dorothy, while Tavia giggled delightedly. “I’ve 
known all along that Garry was having a good 
deal of trouble—he told me that himself. So 
really, you see, Lance is only filling in the details.” 

“Well, when he gets to talkin’ there generally 
ain’t no stoppin’ him,” the young wife warned 

amiably. “But as long as you don’t mind-” 

Lance took advantage of this permission to 
launch immediately into a rambling account of 
the unremitting persecution Garry Knapp had 
suffered ever since he came into possession of his 
Uncle Terry Knapp’s property. 

When he had finished Dorothy’s cheeks were 
hot and in her heart was a tremendous indigna- 




REAL NEWS AT LAST 


151 

tion. And the thought of Joe in company with 
the despicable Larrimer was maddening. 

“How did you know Joe was going to Garry’s 
ranch when you met him with Larrimer?” she 
asked suddenly. 

“The lad told me himself,” said Lance. “And 
when he did, Larrimer gave him a look that 
was as full of p’ison as a rattlesnake’s bite. Only 
he took great care the boy didn’t see it.” 

“But if you knew Joe was in danger, why didn’t 
you take him away—why didn’t you make that 
horrible man give him up?” cried Dorothy, half 
wild with anxiety. “Then you could have taken 
him to Garry yourself.” 

“I didn’t know T he was in danger, Miss Dale. 
I was only guessin’,” the Westerner reminded her 
gently. “And probably my guess was dead wrong 
at that. Probably Larrimer didn’t have no inten¬ 
tion to do nothin’ but what he said. It’s dollars 
to doughnuts your brother Joe is safe and snug 
at the Knapp ranch this minute.” 

“And that’s the reason I didn’t want you to go 
fillin’ her head with unpleasant thoughts, Lance 
Petterby,” said Sue, with a vehemence that was 
rather startling coming from so placid and amia¬ 
ble a person. “I do believe you like to be scarin’ 
people.” 

“Now, you ain’t got no call to talk thataway, 
little hon,” Lance complained gently. “I ain’t 


;i52 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

never scared you none, have I? Always been 
kind and gentle, ain’t I?” 

“That all depends on what you call kind and 
gentle,” retorted young Mrs. Petterby, but the 
girls saw that her eyes were very soft as she 
looked at Lance. 

Tavia’s young namesake chose that moment to 
let out a pathetic wail and Tavia reached out her 
arms impulsively. 

“Do let me take her,” she begged. “You 
must be tired carrying her so far, and I really 
don’t believe she will hate me so much if she takes 
a longer look.” 

The young woman surrendered her burden with 
obvious relief. 

“She’s a right bouncin’ young un,” she sighed, 
but there was a world of pride beneath the com¬ 
plaint. “You would think she was nigh on a year 
old instead of only a few months.” 

The infant almost immediately surrendered to 
her godmother’s blandishments and in no time 
at all the two were the best of chums. 

Dorothy tried to take an interest in the baby, 
but she could not keep her anxious thoughts from 
Garry and Joe. 

Had Joe reached the Knapp ranch in safety? 
Why had not Garry come to meet the train? 
What influence had that man Larrimer over Joe? 

“Lance,” she said, suddenly, “did you see those 


REAL NEWS AT LAST 153 

two men at the station—the two who got off the 
train at the same time Tavia and I did?” 

“The tall guy and the little feller?” queried 
Lance. “You just better believe I did. Those 
two was what me and Sue was lookin’ for. We 
had advance information that they was due on 
this train, but we had a hankerin’ to make sure.” 

“Who are they?” asked Dorothy, while Tavia 
stopped playing with Octavia Susan to listen. 


CHAPTER XXI 


TWO SCOUNDRELS 

“Who? Them?” asked Lance, in apparent 
surprise at the question. “Why, the names of 
those two rogues is mighty unpopular words 
round this section. Reckoned you knew who they 
was. They was the two I been tellin’ you about 
—pals of Larrimer’s.” 

“Not-” began Dorothy. 

Lance nodded, jerking the little car to the 
middle of the road as they bounced over a par¬ 
ticularly uneven spot in the trail that threatened 
to send them into a ditch by the roadside. 

“Stiffbold and Lightly. You got them right 
the first time, ma’am.” 

“Oh, isn’t this perfectly thrilling?” cried Tavia 
delightedly. “At every turn in the road the plot 
thickens!” 

“But they told us their names were Blake and 
Gibbons!” cried Dorothy, leaning forward in 
her seat while Lance, crouched behind the wheel, 
turned half-way around the better to hear her. 

This position undoubtedly imperiled the safety 
of the car and its passengers. It also greatly 
154 



TWO SCOUNDRELS 


155 

alarmed the plump and rosy Mrs. Petterby, who 
had not yet outgrown her fear of the car nor 
developed the absolute faith in her husband’s 
ability to “drive with one hand and the other tied 
behind him” that Lance declared he deserved. 

However, she kept silent, merely gripping the 
edge of the seat with two plump hands and pray¬ 
ing for the best. 

“Very likely they did, Miss Dorothy,” returned 
Lance, in response to Dorothy’s declaration that, 
aboard the train, the names of her traveling com¬ 
panions had been given as Blake and Gibbons. 
“Reckon they have a different set of names for 
every town they stay in. I imagine their moves 
are many and devious and they are not always 
keen on havin’ them followed up.” 

“I wonder what they were doing in Chicago,” 
said Dorothy, speaking her thought aloud. At 
her words Lance immediately, as Tavia described 
it, “pricked up his ears.” 

“Oh, then they was in Chicago?” he said, whis¬ 
tling softly. “Kind of glad to know that, all 
things considered. Ain’t no other information 
you’d like to give me, is there, ma’am?” 

Whereupon Dorothy immediately launched 
into a detailed account of their meeting with the 
two men and of the startling, though unsatisfac¬ 
tory, conversation which she and Tavia had acci- 


156 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

dentally overheard in the dining room of the 
Chicago hotel. 

Lance evinced great interest, especially in the 
fact that Garry’s name had been mentioned. 

“Why should these scoundrels especially pick 
on Garry?” asked Tavia suddenly. “Isn’t there 
anybody besides Garry around here that has some¬ 
thing they want?” 

“There ain’t nobody around here that has 
something that they don’t want to get it away 
from them, Miss Tavia,” rejoined Lance, with 
his grim chuckle. 

“Then why must they pick on Garry? More 
than the rest, I mean?” persisted Tavia. 

Lance shrugged his shoulders eloquently. 

“Because Garry Knapp happens to have the 
largest and most succulent wheat land anywhere 
around here,” he, said. “Lightly and Stiffbold and 
those fellers believe in hookin’ the big fish first. 
Then they can come after us little ones.” 

“Do you think Garry is in any real danger?” 
asked Dorothy slowly. “Any personal danger, I 
mean?” 

Lance shook his head emphatically. 

“Now don’t you go worryin’ about that, at all, 
Miss Dorothy,” he said. “These fellers are 
sneakin’ and mean. But that’s just it—they ain’t 
out-an’-outers. They always tries to play just 
within the law, or as near to the edge of it as 


TWO SCOUNDRELS 


157 

they can. That’s why they haven’t been caught 
long ago and sent to jail like they deserve. There 
ain’t never been anything that you could really 
hang on them—any proof, if you get what I mean. 

“No, they wouldn’t dare do nothin’ to Garry 
except pester the life out of the lad in hopes he’ll 
be glad to sell. If they try any dirty work— 
well, Garry Knapp has plenty of friends to punish 
the offenders!” 

“I know that,” said Dorothy softly. Then 
she added, in a sudden rush of feeling for this 
crude and ingenuous young ranchman with the 
big heart and devoted attachment to Garry: “And 
Garry—and I—Lance, appreciate your friend¬ 
ship.” 

“Oh, I ain’t the only friend he’s got, not by 
a long shot,” protested the young fellow, embar¬ 
rassed, as always in the presence of any genuine 
emotion. “We’re watching those sharpers, you 
can bet.” 

“With the eyes of a hawk,” murmured Tavia, 
and Lance Petterby grinned. 

“You always was great at expressin’ things, 
Miss Tavia,” he said. 

“But what I can’t understand,” said Dorothy, 
as though thinking her thoughts aloud, “is why 
Garry did not come to the station.” 

She caught the quick glance that Lance flung 
at her over his shoulder and could have bitten her 


158 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

tongue out for the admission. Only then did she 
realize the extent of the hurt Garry had inflicted 
by his neglect. 

“I was wonderin’ that same thing myself, 
ma’am,” Lance remarked in his gentle drawl. 
“Reckoned you might have forgot to let Garry 
know which train you was cornin’ on.” 

“Maybe he didn’t get your telegram, Doro,” 
Tavia suggested, shifting the burden of Miss 
Octavia Susan Petterby to the other arm. “They 
do sometimes do that, you know, in spite of all 
beliefs to the contrary. Look at this darling 
child, Doro,” drawing the white knitted coverlet 
down from the dimpled chin of Octavia Susan. 
“Did you ever see anything so adorable in your 
life? She loves her Aunt Tavia, so she do!” she 
crooned in baby talk improvised to suit the occa¬ 
sion. “Went to sleep just like a kitty cat, all 
curled up in a cunnin’ little ball. Oh, look, Doro, 
she’s smiling in her sleep!” 

“That means she has the stomach ache,” said 
the baby’s mother prosaically. “I’ll have to give 
her some hot water when I get her home.” 

Tavia giggled. 

“And I thought she was talking to the angels!” 
she mourned. 

“She won’t talk to no one, let alone angels, 
for some time to come,” retorted the severely 
practical Sue. “And I’d just as lief she wouldn’t, 


TWO SCOUNDRELS 


159 

anyways. Because Ma Petterby says as soon as 
they begin talkin’ they begin getting into mischief, 
too.” 

“Oh, how is your mother, Lance?” asked Doro¬ 
thy, suddenly remembering. “I have meant to 
ask you all along but there has been so much to 
talk about.” 

“She’s fine, thank you, ma’am,” responded 
Lance, his eyes lighting up as he spoke of his little 
old mother. “Ma thinks there ain’t no place like 
Colorado now, and she thinks they ain’t no gal 
like Sue here. Ma just dotes on Sue.” 

“Go long with you,” protested Sue, blushing 
beneath the fond regard of her young husband. 
“You don’t have to tell all the family secrets, do 
you ?” 

“As long as they’s happy ones I don’t see where 
we got any call to hide ’em,” replied Lance mildly. 
“Anyways, my two women folks sure do get along 
fine.” 

“Two women folks,” echoed Tavia, adding, 
with a wicked glance at Dorothy: “But how about 
the third, Lance? I am surprised you haven’t 
mentioned her.” 

The simple Lance looked mystified. 

“Third?” he repeated. “I don’t seem to catch 
your drift, Miss Tavia.” 

“Why, Ophelia. You don’t mean to say you 


i6o DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 


have forgotten Ophelia ?” cried Tavia, and her 
voice was quite properly shocked. 

“Sure enough, I nearly did forget to mention 
Ophelia,” he drawled. “She is well and lively, 
thank you, ma’am, and I know she will be down¬ 
right pleased when I tell her you asked about 
her.” 

“I am sure she will,” returned Tavia, her face 
still grave. “I suppose she has a place of honor 
in the Petterby household, and a high chair at 
the table?” 

“Oh, Tavia, hush,” cried Dorothy in an under¬ 
tone, thinking that the flyaway had gone far 
enough. But both Lance and Sue took the joking 
in good part, Sue even objecting energetically that 
Ma had that little hen clear spoilt to death; that 
it would be allowed to sit on the parlor sofa if it 
didn’t like best to stay in the barnyard with the 
other chickens. 

For Ophelia, despite her high-sounding name, 
was merely a humble fowl which Ma Petterby 
had brought up from a motherless chick and had 
carried with her from New York to Colorado 
in a basket made particularly for the purpose 
when she had come seeking her “baby,” Lance 
Petterby. 

“Ma would be plumb tickled out of her wits to 
see you,” said Lance as the little car bounced into 
the last stretch of road that separated them from 


TWO SCOUNDRELS 


161 


the Hardin ranch. “Couldn’t we go on a little 
ways further now we’re about it and give the little 
old lady the surprise of her life?” 

Although Susan Petterby added her hospitable 
invitation to his, Dorothy reluctantly refused, 
urging as a reason that she dared not delay her 
search for her brother. 

“Now, don’t you worry, ma’am,” Lance urged 
as, a few minutes later, the light car came to a 
sputtering standstill before the rambling old struc¬ 
ture that had once belonged to Colonel Hardin. 
“You will find the lad all right,” he added diffi¬ 
dently, opening the car door for them. “I could 
take a canter over to Garry Knapp’s ranch and 
see if everything’s all right.” 

Dorothy assented gratefully and Tavia reluc¬ 
tantly handed the little warm bundle that was 
Octavia Susan over to her mother. 

“I’m crazy about her and I am going to see 
her often,” said Tavia to the parents of her name¬ 
sake. “That is,” she added, with the bright smile 
that seldom failed to get her what she wanted, 
“if you won’t mind having me hanging around a 
lot.” 

The answer of Lance Petterby was prompt and 
flattering and that of Sue was hardly less so. For 
the heart of a mother is very tender where her 
offspring are concerned and Tavia had shown a 
gratifying interest in Octavia Susan. 


162 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 


“Ma will be tickled to see you,” Lance repeated 
as he drove off in the rattly car. “Come over as 
soon as you can.” 

Lance Petterby’s car had hardly disappeared 
around a turn in the road when a large, handsome 
woman appeared at the kitchen door of the house 
and, after one hasty glance at the newcomers, 
wiped her hands on a kitchen apron and bore 
down upon them. 

“Land sakes!” she cried. “Miss Dorothy Dale 
and Miss Tavia! You did give me the surprise 
of my life, but I’m that glad to see you. Where 
is Major Dale, Miss Dorothy?” 


1 


CHAPTER XXII 


A SURPRISE 

Dorothy had great difficulty in explaining to 
the kindly woman that her father not only had 
not accompanied her and Tavia to Desert City, 
but had no intention of doing so. 

“But two young girls like you havin’ the courage 
to travel all this ways alone!” the woman ejacu¬ 
lated, staring at them as though, in Tavia’s 
words, they were “twin animals out of the zoo.” 
“If that don’t beat all!” 

On the way to the house, and as briefly as pos¬ 
sible, Dorothy explained to the woman—who was 
Mrs. Hank Ledger, wife of the foreman of the 
Hardin ranch—what had brought her to Colo¬ 
rado so unexpectedly. 

The woman listened, her handsome head cocked 
to one side, and occasionally put in a pertinent 
question. 

“Land sakes! I declare, that’s too bad,” she 
said, at the conclusion of Dorothy’s brief recital. 
“I can’t think what could have possessed the boy 
to have done such a thing. But there, that isn’t 
163 


164 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

my business, I guess. Guess I’d better stir you 
up a bite to eat. Near starved, ain’t you?” 

The girls were grateful for her good-hearted 
tact that spared them the embarrassment of fur¬ 
ther questioning. 

They saw nothing of the little Mexican girl 
who had formerly helped the foreman’s wife 
around the ranch house. In her stead was a 
rather stolid country girl who responded to the 
name of Merry. 

“I wonder where Flores is,” said Tavia, when 
they were in their room for a quick wash and a 
change into their riding clothes which they had 
very thoughtfully packed in their grips. “It 
doesn’t seem like the same old ranch with her 
missing.” 

“We must ask Mrs. Ledger about her when 
we go down,” said Dorothy absently, and Tavia, 
noting her tone, turned thoughtful eyes in her 
direction. 

“Worrying about Joe, Doro?” 

“Do I ever do anything else lately?” retorted 
Dorothy, with a sigh. “But I am dreadfully 
worried about Garry too, Tavia. What Lance 
told us about this gang that is out to ‘get him’ is 
anything but comforting.” 

“Suppose you will be stepping over to Garry’s 
ranch as soon as we get a bite to eat,” suggested 
Tavia, and Dorothy nodded. 


A SURPRISE 165 

“If we can be said to step on horseback,” she 
added. 

“Well, the horse steps, doesn’t it?” retorted 
Tavia, but Dorothy was again so absorbed in 
her unhappy thoughts that she did not hear this 
weak attempt at humor. 

“Tavia,” she cried, at last facing her chum, 
“why do you suppose Garry didn’t come to meet 
the train to-day? I don’t know whether to be 
dreadfully angry at him or terribly frightened 
for him.” 

“I don’t believe I would be either until we find 
out more about him than we know at present, 
Doro,” said Tavia gravely. “One thing is cer¬ 
tain, we know Garry well enough to be sure he 
had a good reason for what he did.” 

“The kind of reason we won’t enjoy finding 
out, maybe,” muttered Dorothy so softly that 
Tavia asked for a repetition. 

But instead of answering, Dorothy turned 
toward the door and opened it. 

“I am going downstairs and get a piece of 
bread and butter if there is nothing else,” she 
cried. “I can’t stand the suspense any longer. 
I must know what has happened to Garry and 
Joe.” 

She was out of the room and down the stairs 
before Tavia had finished brushing her hair. 

The latter, following more slowly, found her 


166 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 


chum seated before a repast of cold sliced chicken, 
current jelly, apple pie and milk. 

“Make believe this doesn’t look good to me,” 
said Tavia, and she, too, sat down to prove her 
appreciation. Long before she had finished 
Dorothy rose and ran outside, calling to one of 
the Mexican boys to saddle two fast ponies. 

She saw Hank Ledger, who shook hands with 
her formally, and hastily told him the story she 
had told his wife. 

When she questioned him eagerly, asking him 
if he had seen Joe in the vicinity, he answered 
in the negative. 

“Wherever he’s been, he ain’t come here,” he 
assured her. “Hurry up with them ponies, lad,” 
he called to the swarthy, grinning Mexican boy. 
“These here ladies are in a hurry.” 

Like his wife, Hank Ledger evidently believed 
in showing his sympathy in action rather than in 
words, and again Dorothy was grateful. 

The Mexican appeared presently, leading two 
splendid ponies from the corrals which he pre¬ 
sented to Dorothy with a white-toothed, cheerful 
grin. 

“Fastest ponies we got,” he assured her, and 
Dorothy recognized him as one of the lads who 
had been on the ranch during the eventful vaca¬ 
tion she and her chum had spent there. “Nice 
ones, too. No bite, no kick. Gentle like kittens.” 


A SURPRISE 


167 

Dorothy thanked him with a smile and swung 
herself to the back of the little mustang, leading 
the other toward the house. 

“I can send some of the boys over to the Knapp 
ranch with you, if you say so, Miss Dale,” Hank 
Ledger called after her. In surprise Dorothy 
checked the pony and looked around at him. His 
voice had sounded anxious and his face, now that 
she saw it, matched his voice. 

But anxious about what? 

She asked this question aloud, and Hank Led¬ 
ger’s frown relaxed into a sheepish grin. 

“Folks say that those as look for trouble gen¬ 
erally git it,” he answered enigmatically. “There 
ain’t no reason for me orderin’ a bodyguard for 
you, Miss Dale. Only I’d be mighty glad if you 
would let one of the boys go along with you. 
Your father not bein’ here, I feel sort of respon¬ 
sible-like.” 

Still puzzled, Dorothy thanked him, but refused 
the bodyguard. 

She wondered still more as she approached the 
house why the phlegmatic foreman had thought 
it necessary even to suggest such a thing. 

Surely, bandits did not roam the roads in broad 
daylight! 

Was it Stiffbold and Lightly and Larrimer he 
feared? But what danger was there to her and 
Tavia from any of these men? 


168 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 


She thought of Stanley Blake and the little 
man, Gibbons, who were in reality Stiffbold and 
Lightly. They would know soon—probably did 
already, for they had seen her and Tavia in con¬ 
versation with Lance Petterby—that she and her 
chum had other interests in Desert City than the 
pursuit of a runaway boy. 

Stiffbold had even confided in her to some 
extent concerning his plans. Would it not be 
natural then, when he learned, as he must, that 
she was engaged to Garry Knapp, for him to 
include her in any villainous schemes he might be 
hatching? 

Dorothy felt a thrill of foreboding. She had 
been so busy worrying about others that she had 
never given a thought to her own safety. 

But what did it matter? As long as she could 
feel that Garry and Joe were safe she would not 
very much care what happened to herself. 

But she must get to Garry. In spite of all the 
Stiffbolds and Lightlys, she must get to Garry! 

She saw Tavia coming from the house and 
beckoned to her impatiently. 

“You never give a fellow half a chance to eat, 
Dorothy Dale,” grumbed Tavia, as she came up 
to her. “I wanted another piece of apple pie and 
I went without it for your sweet sake. You ought 
to appreciate it—you really ought.” 

“Which I don’t in the least,” snapped Dorothy, 


A SURPRISE 


169 

at the limit of her patience. “Are you going to 
get on this pony’s back or must I go to the Knapp 
ranch alone?” 

“Well, if I must,” sighed Tavia, and threw her 
leg over the pony’s shining back. 

Something must have frightened the animal at 
that particular moment, for in a flash he flung 
up his head and dashed off across the fields in the 
direction of the corrals, with Tavia clinging wildly 
to his mane. 

Dorothy gasped, touched her pony with her 
spur, and was off like a flash in pursuit. 

Anything might have happened, but fortunately 
nothing very serious did. 

The young Mexican who had saddled the ani¬ 
mals saw the pony coming, swung to the back of 
another, and caught the bridle of the running 
pony as it passed, dragging it to a quivering stand¬ 
still. 

Tavia shifted to a more secure position in the 
saddle, felt her hair to see how greatly it had been 
disarranged, and, when Dorothy came up, was 
smiling winningly at the Mexican. 

The latter whispered something in the run¬ 
away’s ear, slapped it chidingly on the flank and 
turned it gently about till it was headed toward 
the roadway once more. 

The pony seemed entirely tractable after that, 
and the two girls cantered slowly toward the road. 


170 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

Suddenly Dorothy checked her mount and 
looked ahead with eager eyes. 

“Look Tavia!” she cried. “Some one is com¬ 
ing!” 

The rider proved to be Lance Petterby. 

He drew up at sight of the two girls and waved 
his big sombrero at them. 

“Been up to Garry’s,” he shouted, as the girls 
spurred up to him. “Been away all day. With 
most of his boys, too. Only an old, fat, half-deaf 
feller in charge, and he says Garry don’t aim to 
be back much before nightfall.” 

The two girls exchanged glances and Doro¬ 
thy’s face fell. 

“You didn’t see anything of my brother Joe 
about the place, did you, Lance?” she asked, and 
the cowboy reluctantly shook his head. 

“He warn’t nowheres where I could get a sight 
of him, Miss Dorothy,” he said, adding with an 
obvious attempt at reassurance: “But most likely 
if Garry aimed to be away all day he has took the 
lad with him for safe keeping.” 

“Then, I suppose, there is no use going to 
Garry’s ranch if no one is at home,” sighed Doro¬ 
thy. “I don’t understand it at all. Oh, Lance, 
what would you do if you were in my place?” 

“I tell you what I’d do, ma’am,” replied Lance 
Petterby cheerfully. “I’d come right along home 
with me, you and Miss Tavia, and see Ma. She’s 


A SURPRISE 


I 7 i 

mighty much offended that you ain’t looked her 
up already. It might sort o’ take your mind off 
things till Garry gets back.” 

“Oh, Dorothy, let’s!” cried Tavia gleefully. 
“I do so want to see my namesake, my darling 
Octavia Susan, again. She is such a perfect pet 
and she loves her auntie, so she do.” 

Lance grinned and Dorothy’s anxious expres¬ 
sion relaxed into a smile. 

“Very well,” she said. “Only we must not stay 
very long, Lance. Garry may get back sooner 
than he expects.” 

“You can fix that just to suit you, ma’am,” 
answered Lance obligingly. “I know how you 
feel, but I can tell you that if your brother Joe 
is with Garry Knapp his troubles and your’n are 
pretty nigh over.” 

“Yes, if he only is with Garry,” Dorothy agreed 
wistfully. 

They started down the dusty road away from 
the Knapp ranch and Desert City beyond, head¬ 
ing in the general direction of Dugonne. 

They had only gone a short way, however, 
when Lance turned away from the road and led 
them down a trail that wound through the deepest 
part of the woodland. 

“Talk about the primeval forest!” cried Tavia, 
in glee. “If this isn’t it I am, a dumbbell. Oh, 
forgive me, Doro darling. I really didn’t mean 


172 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

to say that dreadful word. I am about to join 
the nation-wide movement for a purer, better 
English—” 

“I feel sorry for the movement then,” said 
Dorothy wickedly, and Tavia went through the 
motions of turning up the collar of her riding 
coat. 

“That was unnecessarily cruel,” complained 
Tavia. “Before Lance, here, too! Never mind, 
I am quite sure he enjoys my slang; don’t you, 
Lance?” 

“You bet I do, Miss Tavia,” agreed Lance, 
his grin broader than ever. “I never see you 
but what I add a few words to my vocabulary. 
Not that it needs it none,” he added, with a 
chuckle. 

They rode for a considerable distance through 
the woods, the ponies doing excellent work over 
the rough trail, and presently came to a small 
clearing in the center of which sat a tiny cabin 
that had “home” written in every line and angle 
of it. 

Lance gave a peculiar whistle that brought both 
his “women folks” running to the door. 

Yes, Ma Petterby ran, too, in spite of the fact 
that she was no longer young and that her old 
joints were crippled with rheumatism. 

She received the girls with literally opened arms 
and seemed so genuinely overjoyed to see them 


A SURPRISE 


173 

that Dorothy was glad she had yielded to Lance’s 
suggestion. 

The little house was as homelike inside as out, 
and the girls were shown through it all by the 
proud Sue, who had herself brightened and en¬ 
riched the unpretentious rooms with pretty needle¬ 
work and bright cretonnes. 

They came back at last to the living room and 
Octavia Susan, rescued from a perilous position 
in her crib, was placed, cooing and gurgling, in 
the delighted Tavia’s arms. 

Ma Petterby regaled them with all the gossip 
of the countryside. Then, when questioned con¬ 
cerning Ophelia, the hen, she told the story of the 
little hen’s entry into farmyard society with so 
much dry humor that the girls were thrown into 
gales of merriment. 

It was Dorothy who finally suggested that they 
should be on their way back to the Hardin ranch. 

Lance, who had disappeared to give the 
“women folks a chance to git real well ac¬ 
quainted,” was nowhere to be found when the 
girls were ready to go, and both Ma Petterby and 
Sue urged the girls to “set and wait” till Lance 
got back. 

But Dorothy, driven always by her anxiety con¬ 
cerning Joe, felt that she: could not wait any 
longer. Garry would almost surely be back by 


174 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

this time and she must get to him at the first 
possible moment! 

Neither of the girls was the least afraid to go 
back alone. The trail, though narrow, was clearly- 
marked and they knew that it would be very easy 
to return the way they had come. 

“But it isn’t safe for two young girls to wander 
around these woods alone,” Ma Petterby pro¬ 
tested. “Lance would be turrible put out if he 
was to think I’d permit it. He’ll most likely be 
back before you get around that curve yonder.” 

“What did you mean when you said it wasn’t 
safe in the woods?” asked Tavia, in her eyes the 
joyful gleam that the prospect of danger and 
excitement always brought to them. “Any lions 
or ‘tagers’ or such-like beasts loose, do you sup¬ 
pose?” 

But Ma Petterby did not return Tavia’s smile. 
She remained unusually grave and the face of 
Sue reflected that gravity. 

“No lions or tigers that I knows on,” she 
replied. “But they’s been a panther hauntin’ 
these woods of late.” 

“A panther! How gorgeous!” cried the irre¬ 
pressible. “I have always wanted to meet one, 
Mrs. Petterby.” 

“Panthers aren’t likely to attack without provo¬ 
cation, are they?” asked Dorothy, and this time 
it was Sue who answered. 


A SURPRISE 


175 


“Most animals—wild animals, that is—would 
ruther slink off without making a fuss unless 
they’re cornered and have to fight,” she said. 
But after a momentary pause she went on with a 
grim tightening of her mouth that made her sud¬ 
denly look like a man: “But there are some of 
’em that are just naturally mean an’ that likes to 
kill for the sake o’ killin’. This panther’s one o’ 
that kind.” 

“Better wait inside for Lance,” urged Ma 
Petterby again. “Under the circumstances, he 
wouldn’t like for us to let you go.” 

But the girls persisted, pointing out that it was 
better for them to go then than to wait until 
evening should fill the woods with shadowy lurk¬ 
ing places. 

For once Tavia agreed with Dorothy and sec¬ 
onded her. Not that she was particularly anxious 
concerning Joe, for she had long since decided in 
her own mind that he was safe with Garry, but 
that mention of the panther had roused her curi¬ 
osity and interest and made her doubly eager to 
start on the trail again. 

The two girls turned to wave to Susan Petterby 
with little Octavia Susan in her arms and to Ma 
Petterby just before a sharp bend in the trail hid 
the small cabin from view. 

“Cute little place they have,” remarked Tavia, 
as she played idly with her pony’s mane. “How 


176 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

happy they are and how comfortable, and how 
simple that sort of life is, Doro. Just think, no 
bother about money, no worry about what you 
are going to eat for the next meal—just go out 
and kill a chicken if you are hungry-” 

“Not Ophelia!” said Dorothy. 

“Not Ophelia, of course,” returned Tavia 
gravely. “That would never do. But, honestly, 
I think it must be fun to live that way.” 

Dorothy gave her a curious glance. 

“Yes, you do!” she gibed. “I can see you living 
in that atmosphere just about one week, Tavia 
Travers, before you’d die from boredom. Ex¬ 
citement is your meat, my dear. Without it, you 
must starve.” 

“How well you have read my nature,” said 
Tavia, with a sigh. “However, there is apt to be 
excitement enough if you can believe Ma Petterby 
and Sue,” she added, with a giggle. “How about 
that man-eating panther they were telling about?” 

“That may not be so much of a joke as you 
seem to think it,” retorted Dorothy, with a nerv¬ 
ous glance over her shoulder. “I’ve heard Garry 
say that panthers are often seen in this part of 
the world.” 

“Maybe; but I bet I’d never have the luck to 
see one,” retorted Tavia dubiously, and Dorothy 
added a fervent: 

“I certainly hope not!” 


A SURPRISE 


1 77 

They had gone some distance along the trail 
when Tavia announced that she was a little stiff 
from riding and would rest herself by walking and 
leading her pony a little way. 

“Good idea !” returned Dorothy, also dismount¬ 
ing with relief. “It takes a little time to become 
accustomed to horseback after you’ve been out 
of the saddle for a while. Whoa, now! What’s 
the matter?” 

This last remark was addressed to the horse, 
who had snorted and reared suddenly. His ears 
lay flat against his head and his eyes were dis¬ 
tended with some nameless terror. 

At the same moment Tavia’s pony showed 
symptoms of fright and danced nervously off the 
trail, being brought back to it only by persistent 
persuasion on Tavia’s part. 

“Now, what on earth ails the beasts?” said 
Tavia, in exasperation. “Stand still there, will 
you? Do you want me to think you have St. 
Vitus’ dance?” 

“Something scared them—” began Dorothy. 

“Oh, you don’t say!” Tavia’s retort was sharp 
and sarcastic, for the action of the ponies had 
alarmed her more than she cared to admit. “I 
could almost believe that without being told.” 

Dorothy took no notice of the acid in Tavia’s 
tone, but continued to soothe her frightened pony. 

After a moment of petting and coaxing he con- 


178 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

sented to go on again, but his ears moved nerv¬ 
ously and he walked daintily as though the rough 
ground of the trail were a carpet of eggs. 

Tavia conquered her pony also, but as they 
went on again she was conscious of a nameless 
dread creeping over her. 

Had she really heard something back there 
in the shadows of the woodland or had it been 
only an oversensitive imagination? 

It was ridiculous to connect Ma Petterby’s story 
of the panther with this suspicion. That miser¬ 
able little pony had given her nerves a jolt, that 
was all. 

She glanced at Dorothy to see if she shared her 
uneasiness, but aside from a frown of concentra¬ 
tion Dorothy displayed no anxiety. She was still 
talking to her pony and stroking his shining coat. 

“I won’t look back into those woods. I won’t!” 
declared Tavia, and immediately did that very 
thing. 

She shivered and started violently. Something 
had slunk behind the trees—something that 
padded on stealthy feet! 

Tavia had caught but a glimpse of that shadowy 
bulk, but it had been enough to crystallize her 
fears. She wanted to cry out to Dorothy, to 
shout her a warning of the danger that threatened 
them. But she was afraid to raise her voice 


A SURPRISE 179 

above a whisper, fearing that any sudden noise 
might precipitate a tragedy. 

Dorothy, leading her pony gingerly a few steps 
behind Tavia, was blissfully unaware of any 
danger. And the worst of it was that Tavia her¬ 
self could not be sure. 

What was it that she had sensed slinking among 
the trees? She had seen something, but whether 
it was man or beast it was almost impossible to 
say. 

The panther? That prowling, sinister beast? 
But it could not be! Panthers did not stalk their 
prey so long and patiently. 

Again, against her will, she stole another 
glance into the shadows of the woods and glimpsed 
again that lurking form keeping always within 
the shelter of the trees. 

There could be no doubt this time! This was 
no human being that followed them, but some 
great beast of the forest. 

Perhaps it was not stalking them with the 
desire to attack. Perhaps, as she had read often 
of the wild inhabitants of the forest, it was fol¬ 
lowing them out of curiosity. Sometimes, she 
recollected, trappers and hunters had been forced 
to endure this sinister, silent companionship for 
considerable distances until the beast tired and 
left them for more interesting company. 

But she shuddered at the thought that the 


180 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 


animal, with the instinct of its kind, might soon 
realize that they were unprotected—had not even 
a gun between them. Then- 

If she had only dared to pause long enough to 
mount her pony—to urge Dorothy to do so—they 
might still have a chance of escape. The ponies 
were swift and used to the broken trail. They 
might outstrip their pursuer or baffle it perhaps 
by the noise and confusion of their flight. 

But she dared not pause, even for an instant. 
Dared call no warning to Dorothy which would 
almost certainly precipitate an attack by that lurk¬ 
ing antagonist. 

She cast another glance over her shoulder and 
felt her heart jump sickeningly as she saw the 
panther had gained upon them. 

It was a panther. She could see the long slim 
body, not so bulky as the lion or tiger but almost 
as large, weaving its way, snake-like, through the 
dense foliage, jewel-like eyes greedily sinister, tail 
fairly touching the ground. 

Dorothy intercepted that look of horror and 
cried out in fright. 

“What is it, Tavia? Did you see something? 
Did you—” her voice trailed off into silence, for 
she also had seen. 

The face she turned back to the watching Tavia 
was drawn and white with terror. She said noth¬ 
ing, but quickened her pace by slow degrees until 



A SURPRISE 


181 

she was close behind Tavia on the narrow trail. 
The ponies now were dancing in terror, trying to 
break away. 

“What are we going to do?” 

Tavia asked the question more by the motion of 
her lips than in spoken words, for she, like Doro¬ 
thy, felt it almost impossible to break that intense, 
waiting stillness. 

Dorothy made a gesture pleading for silence, 
at the same time it urged Tavia to a little faster 
pace. It was plain that Dorothy, like her chum, 
had decided that their one chance lay in their 
ability to ignore the beast. By pretending not 
to notice him, they might gain time, might baffle 
him temporarily. The road could not be far 
distant! 

There was a sound, slight in itself, but break¬ 
ing upon that silence with a horrible significance, 
the sound of a cracking twig. 

The creature was becoming bolder, was creep¬ 
ing up upon them! 

The girls longed to cry out, to scream for help, 
yet could not utter a sound. 

It was like a nightmare, this steady approach of 
the implacable beast. Their limbs felt suddenly 
paralyzed. They had a horrible sensation that 
they could not have run had they wanted to. 

They were going faster, however. Without 
realizing it they had increased their pace till they 


182 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 


were almost running. Probably it was that that 
gave the stalking beast confidence. His victims 
were afraid! The two ponies resisted the efforts 
of the girls to hold them and broke away, bolting 
down the trail. 

A swift, terrified glance behind her told Doro¬ 
thy that the panther had advanced to within 
twenty paces of them. In another moment he 
would be crouching for the spring. 

Dorothy called suddenly to her chum in a queer, 
high voice. 

“Stop, Tavia! Stay where you are. I—I’m 
going to sing!” 

“Sing!” For a moment Tavia could only stare 
in a paralysis of fright and consternation. Doro¬ 
thy must have gone mad! Terror had turned 
her mind! 

Dorothy had taken a stand, had faced the 
crouching beast. She opened her mouth and began 
to sing, tremulously, quaveringly, at first, in a 
cracked, thin voice that chilled the very marrow 
of Tavia’s bones. 

But the beast had halted, uncertain, baffled, had 
crouched close to the ground, baleful eyes fixed 
suspiciously upon Dorothy, tail angrily switching 
the ground. 

Emboldened, Dorothy sang on, her voice gain¬ 
ing strength and confidence as she saw the effect 


A SURPRISE 183 

of her ruse. Tavia, standing still in the trail, 
mouth agape, watched as though hypnotized. 

But it was the panther that was really hypno¬ 
tized. Here was something he could not under¬ 
stand and which, consequently, disturbed and 
baffled him. No one had ever sung to him before, 
and he was instinctively afraid of the thing of 
which he had had no experience. 

Gradually Dorothy and Tavia came to realize 
that the panther would not attack while Dorothy 
continued to sing. But how long could she keep 
it up ? That was the question. 

The cords of her throat were already aching 
with the strain, her voice was becoming thin and 
weak. She could not sing on forever. And when 
she stopped—what then? 

Her voice broke, died away for a moment. 

The great beast so close to them stirred, glared 
ferociously, moved toward them. 

Dorothy began to sing again, and Tavia, sud¬ 
denly ashamed of her silent part in the drama, 
began to sing too. 

Her voice sounded queer to her and she had 
to labor over each note, but with relief they no¬ 
ticed that the beast relaxed again, ceased the nerv¬ 
ous switching of its tail. 

The two girls kept up the singing for what 
seemed to their overwrought nerves an eternity 


184 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

of terror, and gradually they came to the realiza¬ 
tion that their voices were failing. 

The great beast realized it, too. He was be¬ 
coming nervous, uneasy, lustful. Inch by inch he 
was creeping forward, inch by inch! 

Suddenly Tavia’s voice faltered—stopped. 

“I can’t go on, Doro!” she whispered, hysteri¬ 
cally. “I can’t—I can’t-” 

With a snarl the great beast sprang forward, 
ears flat to his head, great paws extended! 

A shot rang out and the panther fell, clawed 
desperately at the air in a curiously impotent ges¬ 
ture, lay still! 

The two girls, clinging to each other, saw Lance 
Petterby come out of the shadows, smoking gun 
in hand. 



CHAPTER XXIII 


GONE AGAIN 

It was decided by the girls and Lance Petterby 
that they would tell no one of their perilous ad¬ 
venture. Dorothy and Tavia were deeply grate¬ 
ful to Lance, who had followed them as soon 
as he had learned that they had left his cabin, 
and had, by so doing, undoubtedly saved their 
lives. At the same time, they were very anxious 
that no one outside of their little trio should know 
of the incident. 

Lance, after catching and bringing back to them 
the two frightened ponies, escaped bashfully from 
the repeated expressions of gratitude of the girls, 
left them at the Hardin ranch with the declara¬ 
tion that he would ride straight to Garry’s “dig¬ 
gings” and, provided that he had returned, would 
send him directly to them. 

It was only a short time after that that Doro¬ 
thy, still astride her little Mexican pony, espied 
a rider in the distance. 

“Seems to be in a big hurry, too,” said Tavia, 
185 


186 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 


as her eyes followed the direction of Dorothy’s 
pointing finger. “I wonder where the fire is.” 

“Tavia!” Dorothy’s tone was sharp with 
excitement. “I think it is—why, I believe it is 
Garry!” 

“Looks like a cloud of dust to me,” scoffed 
Tavia. “In your case, I think, the wish is father 
to the thought, Doro mia.” 

“Well, let’s wait here and see who it is, any¬ 
way,” urged Dorothy. She noted the fact that 
Tavia looked at her curiously. “At the rate he 
is going I would hate to get in his way,” she 
added. Dorothy was of no mind to tell her chum 
of Hank Ledger’s mysterious behavior or of her 
own apprehension in regard to Stiffbold and 
Lightly. 

They waited at the edge of the road for the 
horseman to come up. As the dust cloud cleared 
away and they could see him more plainly, Doro¬ 
thy cried out with joy and urged her pony for¬ 
ward. 

Tavia stared for a moment and then followed 
at a slow canter. 

By the time she reached them, Garry’s gray, 
dust-covered mare and Dorothy’s little pony were 
close together. As for the riders, Tavia could 
not immediately tell which was which! 

“Don’t mind me!” she laughed. “If I am too 


GONE AGAIN 187 

entirely out of the picture, just let me know and 
I will take myself hence.” 

Dorothy put aside the iron grip of Garry’s 
arms and her pony reared uneasily. Garry caught 
its bridle, drew the little mustang up against his 
gray mare, and looked at Dorothy as though he 
were ready to begin all over again. 

“Garry—don’t!” she gasped. “Don’t you— 
can’t you—see that Tavia is here ?” 

“He doesn’t,” sighed Tavia. “But I forgive 
him even that.” 

Garry laughed and urged the gray mare across 
the road. He held out his hand and Tavia 
grasped it forgivingly. 

“Sorry I didn’t see you right away,” apologized 
Garry. “You see,” with an ardent glance in 
Dorothy’s direction, “my vision was momentarily 
obscured.” 

“Not momentarily—perpetually when Dorothy 
is around, Garry, my lad,” scoffed Tavia. “I’ve 
watched you when you weren’t looking.” 

“Horrors! What spying wench is this?” cried 
Garry and, looking at Dorothy, saw that her face 
had suddenly become grave. 

“Garry,” she asked, “why weren’t you at the 
train to meet us?” 

“Well, listen to that!” cried Garry looking at 
his fiancee helplessly. “How could I meet a train 


188 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 


when I hadn’t the remotest idea you had taken 
one!” 

“Then you didn’t know we were coming?” cried 
Dorothy. “You never got my telegram saying 
when I was coming?” 

“Of course not, dear girl,” said Garry gravely, 
as he took her pony’s bridle and led it gently from 
the road and back up the graveled drive that led 
to the Hardin ranch house. “Do you suppose 
for a minute that if I had known you were coming 
out here I wouldn’t have been cooling my heels 
at the station an hour ahead of time?” 

“Of course, I supposed that,” admitted Doro¬ 
thy, turning her eyes away from the look in 
Garry’s. “But I can’t understand why my tele¬ 
gram didn’t reach you.” 

“I got one telegram from you,” said Garry. 
He looked around as though to make sure that 
no one was near them and said in an instinctively 
lowered tone: “You said something about over¬ 
hearing some plot or other in which the conspira¬ 
tors hoped to land me one with a good large brick. 
Such plots as those are no novelty in my young 
life,” he added grimly. “But I appreciate the 
warning, coming from a little brick.” 

“But, Garry,” Dorothy’s voice was tremulous 
and in her eyes was a haunting fear, “there is 
one thing I want to ask you. I’ve been hoping 
you would tell, because I didn’t want to ask you. 


GONE AGAIN 


189 


I was afraid to ask you. Garry, have you seen 
Joe?” 

Garry’s face darkened and he pulled his horse 
to a standstill before the ranch house. Dorothy 
drew in her rein also and sat tensely watching 
him. 

“I have seen Joe—yes,” replied Garry slowly, 
showing a sudden burst of emotion. “And I 
wish to heaven I could let the story rest there!” 

Dorothy grasped his arm wildly, imploring 
him. 

“What do you mean, Garry? Tell me what 
do you mean! Oh, don’t you see I’ve got to 
know?” 

“There is so little I can tell you, dear girl,” 
said Garry gravely. “I saw him. He came to 
me, half-starved and wild-eyed with an incoherent 
story about breaking away from a man who was 
trying to take him off into the mountains-” 

“Larrimer!” gasped Dorothy, white-faced. 

Garry nodded. 

“Certainly Larrimer, judging from Joe’s de¬ 
scription and Lance Petterby’s story of having 
seen the lad in the company of that villain.” 

“But, Garry—what next?” Dorothy was con¬ 
scious that Garry was holding her hand in a tight 
grip and she clung to him desperately. “There 
is something else!” 



190 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

“Yes,” said Garry simply. “This morning Joe 
disappeared.” 

He put his arm about Dorothy, for she had 
reeled in her saddle and her face was so white it 
frightened him. 

“Let me take you into the house, Dorothy,” 
he urged. “Mrs. Ledger will fix you up.” 

But at the suggestion Dorothy seemed to gain 
strength. 

“No, no!” she cried. “I am all right. Let me 
do what I must. Please, please, Garry.” 

“What is it you want to do, dear?” asked Garry 
gently. 

“Go after Joe—now—this minute! He cannot 
have got far away if he only disappeared this 
morning, Garry!” She paused and regarded him 
intently. “Do you think it is possible Joe might 
have run away again of his own accord?” 

“I certainly do not,” returned Garry vehe¬ 
mently. “And if you had seen the poor lad when 
he stumbled on to my preserves, you wouldn’t 
even have to ask that question. Why, he was 
almost tearful in his gratitude at being safe again, 
and I am quite sure nothing could have made him 
leave the place of his own accord. He had no 
reason to fear me.” 

“Then you think he was taken—kidnapped?” 
asked Dorothy slowly. 

Garry nodded, his pitying eyes on her face. 


GONE AGAIN 


191 

“I wish I could have spared you all this, my 
dear,” he said. “My men and I have been out 
scouring the hills ever since we discovered the 
lad’s disappearance. I had just come back to 
the ranch to see if there had been any develop¬ 
ments there when Lance Petterby came along and 
told me you girls were here on the ranch. Of 
course I then spurred right on here.” 

“But who would do such a thing?” cried Doro¬ 
thy pitifully. “What motive could any one pos¬ 
sibly have in tormenting my poor Joe?” 

“I don’t know,” replied the young Westerner 
grimly, “unless it was some of Larrimer’s crowd 
hoping through him to get at me. If that’s their 
scheme I will pretty quickly show them where they 
get off! Caught Philo Marsh hanging around 
the place, and I pretty near kicked him over the 
fence.” 

“Philo Marsh!” cried Tavia, who had listened 
in silent sympathy to Garry’s revelations concern¬ 
ing Joe. “Is he still around here?” 

“He is!” said Garry shortly. “Wherever the 
smoke is thickest and the trouble hottest, there 
you may expect to find Mr. Philo Marsh.” 

“Same evil, old bird of prey, too, no doubt!” 
exclaimed Tavia. 

“Do you think he was the one who kidnapped 
Joe?” asked Dorothy. She was strangely quiet 
now. But in her burned a determination that 


192 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

grew stronger with each moment. “Have you 
any reason to suspect him more than the others?” 

“None whatever except that I happened to see 
him just before Joe disappeared. Philo Marsh 
is pretty closely connected with Larrimer and 
those other arch-knaves, Stiffbold and Lightly, 
just now; but of course it might have been any 
of the others.” 

“What did you mean just now by saying that 
they might hope to strike at you through Joe?” 
asked Dorothy slowly, as though she were pains¬ 
takingly trying to reason things out for herself. 
“I didn’t quite understand you, Garry.” 

“That is only because you do not know my 
enemies, dear,” returned Garry. “Those fellows 
have done everything in their power to run me off 
my land. The longer I thwart them, the more 
determined they get. They are trying to force 
me to sell out for a song, sign my lands over to 
them.” 

“But you won’t?” cried Dorothy. 

“I guess not!” Garry’s eyes kindled and his fist 
clenched. “But it is possible that in this move— 
this kidnapping of the boy—they may hope to 
force me to something that they never could 
otherwise.” 

“You mean,” said Dorothy slowly, “that if 
you agree to sign over your land to them at a 
ridiculous price they will release Joe?” 


GONE AGAIN 


193 


Garry nodded. 

“And if you don’t agree?” 

Garry’s face paled. Then he turned to Doro¬ 
thy, caught her hands in his, gripping them 
fiercely. 

“I promise you, Dorothy, that they shall never 
hurt Joe!” 


CHAPTER XXIV 


A WASTED BULLET 

Then Dorothy did an astonishing thing— for 
her. She leaned over and kissed Garry with such 
an air of faith and trust that Tavia turned away. 
She had a horrible suspicion that she was going 
to cry. 

But the sudden appearance of Hank Ledger 
and others of the ranch hands saved Tavia from 
that fate. 

After one long look at Dorothy, in which she 
could read many things, Garry turned to the new¬ 
comers. He rapidly went over the details of 
Joe’s disappearance and enlisted their aid in car¬ 
rying out a more thorough search than had yet 
been made. 

Dorothy thrilled when she saw how ready they 
all were to back him up. But Garry knew that 
it was not only for him or for Dorothy or for 
Joe that they so readily promised their help, 
although he had reason to believe that they were 
all friends of his, but because they one and all 
hated Larrimer and his gang with a deadly hatred 

194 


A WASTED BULLET 


195 

and welcomed the chance to even up some old 
scores. 

There was one young “broncho buster,” a 
strapping lad in his early twenties, who testified 
to having seen a boy and two men riding toward 
the mountains. 

Garry whirled on him swiftly. 

“Who were these two men?” he demanded. 

The young fellow shook his head sadly. 

“I sure would give a barrel of money to be 
able to honestly tell you that, boss,” he answered. 
“I tried to get up to them, but they was goin’ 
all-fired fast and when they saw me they continued 
on the way they was goin’, only about three times 
as fast.” 

“Why didn’t you-all try a bullet on him, Steve?” 
drawled one of his mates as he slouched in the 
saddle, hat drawn low over a pair of fiery blue 
eyes. “That there might have added an element 
of persuasion, so to speak.” 

“Yes, that there’s just what I did,” the young¬ 
ster responded sadly. “And wasted a good bullet 
on a couple o’ rattlesnakes. Even at that distance 
I was middlin’ sure I recognized ’em.” 

“Well, speak out, man,” commanded Garry 
sharply. “We’re in a hurry. Who were they, to 
your thinking?” 

“Near’s I could make out they was Philo Marsh 
and Stiffbold, boss,” returned the lad, and a 


196 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

muttering like the rumble of thunder in the dis¬ 
tance came from the little knot of men. “Philo 
tries to ride his horse’s head and bounces in the 
saddle like a tenderfoot. I couldn’t be so sure 
about Stiffbold, but I was sure enough to waste 
a good bullet on him.” 

“Well, let’s go!” cried Garry, wheeling his 
horse so suddenly that it reared and bucked alarm¬ 
ingly. “With the information you have been able 
to give us, Steve, we ought to be able to find 
these fellows without much difficulty. We will 
be back before long, Dorothy, and the next time 
you see us we will have Joe along. Promise not 
to worry!” 

Dorothy looked at him in swift alarm. 

“You don’t mean that you intend to go without 
me and Tavia!” she cried, still incredulous, 
though he nodded decisively in answer. “Why, 
Garry, you can’t! We can’t stay here alone, 
thinking, wondering!” 

“But this is a man’s job, Dorothy,” Garry ex¬ 
plained gently. “You would only hamper us and 
hold us back in the search for Joe. You don’t 
want to do that, do you?” 

Dorothy turned away, her lip quivering. Garry 
took her hand and gripped it fiercely for a mo¬ 
ment. Then turnd to his men and nodded. 

“Let’s go!” he called again, and there was an 
answering shout, triumphant and fierce, as the 


A WASTED BULLET 


19 Z 

others closed in after him and galloped down 
the road in a cloud of dust. 

The two girls remained quiet until the clatter 
of hoofs had died away in the distance, Dorothy, 
trying to fight the bitter disappointment that 
burned within her, Tavia staring thoughfully af¬ 
ter the cavalcade. 

The latter finally looked at Dorothy, a quiz¬ 
zical and sympathetic smile playing about the 
corners of her mouth. 

“Come on, Doro, don’t take it so much to 
heart,” she urged, adding judicially: “Of course 
you know Garry is right—really—although it 
isn’t very pleasant to be told that you will be 
in the way.” 

“I shouldn’t be in the way. He doesn’t know 
me yet,” said Dorothy, in a stifled voice. “And 
I wanted to go with him, to look for Joe.” 

“Of course you did, you poor dear,” said Tavia 
sympathetically. Then she added, as a daring 
gleam crept into her pretty eyes: “And I don’t 
know that Garry ought to have everything to 
say about it, at that!” 

Dorothy turned quickly toward her. A hot 
flush rose to her face. 

“What do you mean?” she demanded. 

“Oh, Doro, you know well enough what I 
mean. Why pretend you don’t?” By this time 
Tavia’s eyes were frankly dancing. “Since when, 


198 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

Task you, have we come to the point where we 
may be ordered about by any man?” 

“You mean,” cried Dorothy breathlessly, “that 
you suggest that we organize a search party of 
two?” 

“Who said I was suggesting anything?” pro¬ 
tested Tavia impishly. “I can’t open my mouth 
but what my words are misconstrued.” 

“Misconstrued, your grandmother!” retorted 
Dorothy rudely, at which Tavia chuckled in great 
delight. “I haven’t lived with you all my life, 
Tavia—more or less—without being pretty sure 
what you mean, as a rule. Are you coming or 
must I go alone?” 

“Well, of all the nerve!” crowed Tavia in 
huge delight, as she spurred her mount down the 
road in the wake of Dorothy’s mettlesome pony. 
“I’ll say there is nothing slow about Dorothy 
these days—or Garry either. This promises to 
be a real interesting party.” 

“I say, Dorothy,” she called, as she urged her 
pony neck and neck with Dorothy’s galloping 
mount, “we ought to work out some plan of 
attack, you know. We really ought. We’ll prob¬ 
ably just be rushing into trouble this way.” 

With difficulty Dorothy drew her pony to a 
walk and regarded her chum thoughtfully. 

“I don’t know how we can make any plans 


A WASTED BULLET 


199 

when we haven’t the slightest idea what we are 
going to do next,” she said. 

“We know just as much as Garry,” Tavia 
retorted. “That good-looking cowboy—Steve, 
did Garry call him—said that the two men and 
the boy disappeared in that direction,” and she 
swept an arm toward the mountains rising majes¬ 
tically before them. “Look!” she cried suddenly, 
leaning from the saddle and gripping Dorothy’s 
arm. “Do you see those two tall peaks with the 
smaller one between? If we keep our eye on 
that formation we can’t go far wrong.” 

“But we shall lose sight of your church spires 
as soon as we enter the woods,” objected Doro¬ 
thy, and Tavia’s face fell. 

“That’s right,” she admitted. “You’re a better 
man than I am, Dorothy Dale. Oh, but I’ll tell 
you what,” she added, on the crest of another 
illumining thought. “There’s a trail—the one we 
used to follow when we were here before, don’t 
you remember? I am very sure that winds 
through the woods in the general direction Steve 
pointed out. It probably is the very one the 
kidnappers used when they spirited Joe away,” 
she added triumphantly. 

“I wish you wouldn’t call them kidnappers, 
Tavia,” Dorothy objected nervously. “It sounds 
so horrid.” 

“Well, I could think of a good many worse 


200 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 


things to call Philo Marsh and your gallant 
friend, Stiffbold,” retorted Tavia. “Doro—I do 
believe—why, yes, here is the trail right here!” 

Tavia had checked her horse at the edge of the 
wood and Dorothy turned her own pony, riding 
back to her. 

“Looks like a pretty dark and gloomy one to 
me,” she said, eyeing the narrow, rocky path 
through the woods with marked disfavor. “But 
if it’s the best you can do, I suppose we might 
try it.” 

“Such is gratitude!” sighed Tavia. “I ought 
never to expect it.” 

“Tavia!” Dorothy was ahead, leading her horse 
carefully up the narrow trail that rose steeply 
as it followed the rise of the mountain. Her 
voice, muffled, came back eerily to Tavia as she 
followed. “I suppose Aunt Winnie would think 
we were crazy to do a thing like this.” 

“We are,” retorted Tavia, adding with a 
chuckle: “But as soon as I cease to be crazy 
I shall want to die !” 

“The Major would understand though,” said 
Dorothy, still as though talking to herself. “He 
would know that I couldn’t stand back and just 
wait when Joe was in danger.” 

“You bet he would, honey,” said Tavia reas¬ 
suringly. “You could count on the Major to 
understood every time.” 


A WASTED BULLET 201 

“Do you think we are following the right 
trail?” Dorothy asked, some time later. 

They had reached a level spot and paused to 
rest their ponies, and were looking back the way 
they had come. 

“I don’t know,” returned Tavia, with a 
thoughtful shake of her head. “All we can do is 
to follow the trail as far as it goes, Doro, and 
hope for the best. Hark! What’s that?” 


CHAPTER XXV 


THE STORM 

There came to the girls’ ears the grumbling 
of thunder, faint at first but growing louder as 
it flung itself against the lofty mountains. A flash 
of lightning illumined the semi-dusk of the woods. 

The ponies pricked up their ears nervously and 
danced a little, threatening to unseat their riders. 
But the girls spoke to them gently and soothingly 
and in a moment had them under control again. 

“I suppose we ought to go back,” said Dorothy. 
“You know what storms are up here. And the 
ponies don’t like the thunder.” 

“So it seems,” said Tavia dryly, adding, as 
she turned her pony so that its nose was pointing 
toward the trail again: “You may go back, if you 
like, Dorothy Dale, but I am going on. You are 
not afraid of a little storm, are you?” 

“Only this doesn’t promise to be a little one,” 
replied Dorothy shortly. “But come on. If we 
keep the ponies on the trail-” 

“All may yet be well,” finished Tavia. “Whew 
—that was a bad one!” she added, as a terrific 


202 



THE STORM 


203 

crash of thunder flung itself against the moun¬ 
tainside and retreated, grumbling ominously. 

The ponies attempted to stand on their hind 
legs again but the girls only urged them on the 
faster. 

The storm was waxing fast and furious now. 
The wind tore down upon them in titanic gusts, 
catching at their breath, whipping twigs and 
branches across their faces, fairly blinding them. 

Another terrific crash of thunder came, a 
vicious streak of lightning, and then the rain! 

It did not come slowly in gentle little drops, 
but burst upon them in full fury, soaked them 
to the skin in its first onslaught, enveloped them 
in a solid sheet of water. 

They struggled on, urging their reluctant ponies 
up the rocky trail—up and up, while the trail 
grew ever steeper, the ground more thickly strewn 
with rocks and tree stumps, more impassable. 

It seemed to the girls that they were like flies, 
clinging to the walls of a precipice. 

A hideous crash of thunder, more terrific than 
any that had preceded it, broke shatteringly above 
them and seemed to cause the very ground be¬ 
neath their feet to tremble. 

Dorothy’s pony, scrambling over a huge boul¬ 
der in the trail, slipped, stumbled, caught itself, 
and then, in fright, reared suddenly backward. 

Caught unawares, Dorothy shot from her 


204 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

saddle like a bullet from a gun and rolled down 
the steep incline directly beneath the feet of Ta- 
via’s prancing pony. 

The whole thing was so sudden, so horrible, 
that Tavia could only gasp in sickening fear. 

But it was the gallant beast she rode that saved 
the life of her chum, helpless beneath the death- 
dealing hoofs. 

The pony reared, balanced with his forefeet in 
the air for a moment while Dorothy’s life hung 
in the balance. Then, with a terrific effort and 
almost human intelligence, he flung himself back¬ 
ward and to one side. 

Even then his forefeet came to earth gently, 
tentatively, making sure that they touched only 
earth and stone. Then he stood quite still, shiv¬ 
ering. 

Dorothy lay beneath his body, her arm flung 
out, her face turned upward to the sky. She was 
as still as death and a sinister red spot grew upon 
her forehead—grew and widened while two tiny 
rivulets of blood ran down her cheek. 

For a moment Tavia stared down at her chum 
as though paralyzed. She dared not move for 
fear her action might excite the shivering pony 
and cause him to move only the fraction of an 
inch. 

“But I must get down,” she told herself dully, 
as though in a terrible dream. “Any minute the 


THE STORM 


205 

pony may move. Anyway—oh, Dorothy! Doro¬ 
thy!” 

Slowly and with infinite care she let herself 
down from the saddle on the opposite side from 
her chum, speaking gently to the pony, patting his 
neck, urging him to stand quietly. 

But the gallant little beast needed no urging. 
He knew as well as Tavia that a human life 
depended on his ability to remain absolutely still. 

Except for the nervous quivering of his muscles 
he stood like a horse carved out of rock as Tavia 
lifted her chum from her perilous position and 
laid her gently on the grass beside the trail. 

The thunder was more frequent, more deafen¬ 
ing in its increasing nearness. The rain continued 
to pour down in a great torrential flood. 

Tavia’s hair had come down and was clinging 
soddenly to her face and neck. She had to push 
it back before she could look at Dorothy, shake 
her, wildly call her by name, beg her sobbingly 
to open her eyes and look at her. 

The blood was still coming from the cut in 
Dorothy’s forehead, but aside from that vivid 
blotch of color, her face was deadly pale. 

Tavia sought for and found a clean handker¬ 
chief in the pocket of her riding coat. With this 
she sought to staunch the wound. The handker¬ 
chief became red and sodden and still the wound 
bled freely, sickeningly. 


206 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 


Tavia stumbled to her feet and, with a hand 
before her eyes to ward off the twigs and branches 
that lashed at her face, fought her way back 
along the trail toward a spot where they had 
passed a mountain brook. 

She knelt beside the stream, saturated the hand¬ 
kerchief with the almost ice-cold water, and re¬ 
turned to Dorothy. Several times she made the 
trip, until she was bruised and torn and panting. 

Finally she had her reward. The blood ceased 
to flow and, washing away the last traces of it, 
Tavia was able to inspect the wound more closely. 

To her surprise and intense relief she found 
that, instead of being on her forehead, the cut 
began farther up, on the scalp, just reaching past 
the line of the hair. 

That then, was the reason it had bled so pro¬ 
fusely. A scalp wound is in appearance usually 
worse than in reality, sending out wild signals of 
distress when there is really very little to be 
distressed about. 

Dorothy had evidently in falling struck upon 
a pointed stone, gashing the scalp jaggedly and 
in such a way that it seemed an ugly wound. 

“Might have killed her,” muttered Tavia. “If 
she would only open her eyes! Perhaps some 
water—” But the irony of that suggestion curved 
her lips in a wry smile. Foolish to talk of water 


THE STORM 


207 

when nature was supplying it in bucketfuls, free of 
charge! 

At that moment Dorothy stirred, lifted her 
hand in an aimless gesture and made as though 
to rise. 

Tavia put a hand beneath her chum’s head, 
lifting her a little. 

“Take it easy, Doro honey,” she advised gently. 
“You have had a pretty hard knock, and it may 
take a little while for you to remember what 
happened. Oh, keep still, will you!” she cried 
to the elements in senseless fury as a crash of 
thunder shook the earth, drowning out her last 
words. “Don’t you know it isn’t polite to in¬ 
terrupt a person while she’s talking? Doro dar¬ 
ling,” as Dorothy once more made an effort to 
rise, “how are you feeling?” 

“All right—I guess,” said Dorothy unsteadily. 
“I seem a little—dizzy.” 

Tavia tried to laugh and made a rather dismal 
failure of it. 

“I should think you might,” she said. “After 
a fall like that!” 

“What happened?” asked Dorothy, sitting up, 
her hand feeling instinctively for the painful cut 
in her head. “I fainted, didn’t I?” 

“You surely did, Doro, my love!” responded 
Tavia, once more herself now that Dorothy was 
out of danger. “You fainted good and plenty, 


208 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 


and I don’t mind telling you you gave me the 
scare of my life.” 

“Sorry—but I guess we had better get away 
from here,” said Dorothy, still faintly, looking 
uneasily about her. She clapped her hands to her 
ears nervously as another thunder clap broke 
above their heads. “Help me, Tavia, please—I 
feel a little—weak.” 

She tried to stumble to her feet, but sank down 
again with a cry of alarm. 

“Not so fast!” Tavia scolded her. “You lost 
quite a good deal of blood, my dear, if you did 
but know it, and naturally you feel pretty faint.” 

“Blood!” echoed Dorothy alarmed. “I had no 
idea-” 

“Only a scalp wound,” Tavia said quickly. “But 
it bled like sixty. Now, let’s try it again. That’s 
the idea. Feel better?” 

Dorothy stood, swaying a little on her feet, 
Tavia’s supporting arm about her shoulders. 

“I guess I don’t remember just what happened, 
but I guess I must owe my life to you, Tavia.” 

“No, you don’t,” denied Tavia quickly, adding, 
as she pointed to the pony standing quietly enough 
now where she had left it. “There’s the fellow 
you ought to thank!” 




CHAPTER XXVI 


A GENTLEMAN 

Dorothy looked bewildered. Swiftly and with 
a return of the emotion she had felt at that time 
of her chum’s great peril, lending eloquence to 
her words, Tavia told Dorothy what had hap¬ 
pened. 

“That blessed pony knew you were lying there, 
helpless under his feet,” she said, “and, like the 
gentleman and thoroughbred he is, he wasn’t go¬ 
ing to hurt a lady if he could help it. You should 
have seen him, Doro, pawing the air to make 
sure he wasn’t touching you. 

“And then when I pulled you out from under 
him he stood so still you would have thought he 
was holding his breath for fear he would move. 
I never saw an animal act like that. He was 
human, Doro!” 

Dorothy took an uncertain step toward the little 
pony, hands outstretched, and Tavia regarded her 
curiously. 

“What are you going to do?” she asked. 

There was a curious catch in her voice as Doro¬ 
thy answered softly: 


209 


2io DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 


“I am going to thank—a gentleman.” 

She put an arm about the pony’s neck and with 
her other hand gently stroked his soft muzzle. 
And as though he understood what she was trying 
to say to him, the little horse nuzzled against 
her shoulder and whinnied gently. 

Suddenly Tavia thought of the other pony, the 
one that had so nearly precipitated Dorothy to 
her death. 

She found him standing on the ledge above 
them, tossing his head nervously now and then 
at some particularly harsh rumble of thunder or 
flash of lightning, but making no attempt to stray 
away. 

“Lucky for us they gave us a couple of gentle, 
domesticated ponies,” remarked Tavia, as she 
climbed the trail to bring the pony back to the 
spot where Dorothy was standing, her arm still 
about the neck of the little horse. “One with a 
wilder strain in him would have shown us his 
heels long since and one of us would have been 
obliged to walk back.” 

Returning with the captured pony slipping and 
sliding down the trail behind her, Tavia looked 
anxiously at her chum. 

“Do you think you are strong enough to sit 
in a saddle, Doro? Because if you’re not-” 

“Oh, I am,” protested Dorothy quickly. “I 
feel strong enough to do anything except stay 


A GENTLEMAN. 211 

in this awful place, Tavia. Listen to that 
thunder!” 

“Quite a pretty storm!” Tavia admitted. 
“Now, Doro dear, if you will let me help you 
into the saddle, perhaps we had better start.” 

“We are going back though,” asserted Dorothy 
almost defiantly, and was relieved when Tavia 
agreed with her. 

It \yas obvious that with Dorothy in her pres¬ 
ent condition, they could gain nothing by going 
on. The only sensible thing, under the circum¬ 
stances, was to return to the safety and comfort 
of the ranch. Mrs. Hank Ledger’s kitchen seemed 
particularly alluring to them just then! 

Tavia helped Dorothy into the saddle—almost 
lifted her, in fact—and was more than ever 
alarmed to see how much the accident had weak¬ 
ened her chum. 

Dorothy was game—game as they come—she 
told herself loyally. But nothing could hide the 
trembling hands ahd the fact that it required 
all Dorothy’s will power, even with Tavia’s help, 
to climb into the saddle. 

It had been tacitly decided that Dorothy should 
ride Hero—for so she had dubbed the little horse 
in appreciation of what he had done—on the 
return journey. 

But as she turned the pony’s head and looked 


212 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 


back over the sharply-sloping trail up which they 
had clambered, Dorothy’s heart misgave her. 

The descent would be infinitely more difficult 
than the ascent had been. The ponies, though 
sure-footed and used to the rough mountain trails, 
would be in constant danger of slipping on the 
wet rocks and moss. 

Guessing her thoughts, Tavia urged her own 
pony close to her chum and stood for a moment 
beside her, staring down the steep descent. 

“Looks pretty bad, doesn’t it?” she said sob¬ 
erly, after a moment. “But I guess we will have 
to risk it, Doro. We can’t very well stay where 
we are.” 

“No, we can’t stay where we are,” repeated 
Dorothy automatically, adding, as she pressed her 
hand, palm out, against her forehead: “But I am 
so dizzy, Tavia. When I look down it seems 
as if the earth rose up to meet me.” 

“Then don’t look down!” cried Tavia sharply, 
noting with an access of alarm that Dorothy 
reeled in the saddle as she spoke. “Look up as 
much as you can, Doro, and hold on tight to the 
pony’s mane if you feel yourself slipping. Oh, I 
wish Garry were here!” 

Perhaps she had revealed more of her alarm 
than she had meant to in that exclamation. 

At any rate, Dorothy looked at her queerly, 


A GENTLEMAN 


213 

and, with a huge effort of will, jerked herself 
upright in the saddle. 

‘Tm all right, Tavia,” she said courageously. 
“I’ll keep hold of the pony’s mane as you said. 
But, Tavia—you go first!” 

Her heart full of misgivings, Tavia urged her 
pony forward and began the steep and slippery 
descent to the road far below. 

It seemed for a little while that the elements, 
having given them a taste of what they could 
really do if put to it, had decided to take mercy 
on them. 

There was a lull in the storm. The rain con¬ 
tinued to fall, but more gently, and the thunder 
seemed to have spent its fury, retiring into the 
distance with muttered and ever decreasing rum¬ 
blings. 

But just as the girls, making slow progress of it 
and stopping every now and then to rest and give 
Dorothy a chance to rally her forces, had begun 
to hope that the storm was almost over, it burst 
upon them again, more furiously than ever. 

Came the rain again and then the wind, bending 
trees backward before its onslaught, driving the 
rain relentlessly into their faces, forcing them to 
halt every few paces to pass a hand across their 
blinded eyes and peer anxiously along the trail. 

“We shall be lost if we don’t look out,” Doro¬ 
thy panted, during one of these pauses. 


214 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

“Look out!” repeated Tavia, with a brief 
laugh. “Fine chance we have to look out when 
we can’t see more than a few feet before our 
faces. How are you feeling, Doro—any strong¬ 
er?” 

“Oh, I’m all right,” Dorothy responded. But 
in spite of the brave assertion, Tavia knew that 
she was not all right, that she was fighting every 
inch of the way to keep herself erect in the saddle. 
Despite her effort to hide it, Tavia saw that she 
was trembling an over. 

“Cold?” she asked, and again Dorothy shook 
her head, this time almost impatiently. 

“Let’s go on,” she cried. “We must be very 
near the road by this time.” 

But Tavia knew that they were not near the 
road. In fact, it was not very long before Tavia 
made a discovery that startled her. In the sudden 
fright that caught at her throat she must have 
made some sort of an ejaculation, for Dorothy, 
reining up beside her, called above the noise of the 
storm: 

“Did you say anything, Tavia?” 

“Nothing, except that we are not on the trail,” 
retorted Tavia calmly. “Dorothy, I am very 
much afraid that we are lost!” 


CHAPTER XXVII 


WHAT WAS THAT? 

Dorothy stood very quiet for a moment, say¬ 
ing nothing, just staring at her chum. 

Then suddenly she began to laugh—a wild sort 
of laughter that had tears in it. 

Tavia looked at her sharply, then reached out 
a hand and gripped her hard. 

“Dorothy, you’ve got to stop that!” she cried. 
“There isn’t anything to laugh about—really, you 
know.” 

“That’s why I’m laughing, I guess!” retorted 
Dorothy. 

But she had stopped her untimely mirth and 
was gazing moodily enough at the sodden, dreary 
forest about them. 

“We shouldn’t be standing under a tree in a 
thunder and lightning storm,” she said absently. 
“It’s dangerous.” 

It was Tavia’s turn to laugh. 

“So I’ve heard,” she said. “And if you can tell 
me any way that we can avoid it, I’ll be very 
grateful. Oh, Doro, what’s the use? We are 
just stuck, that’s all.” 


215 


216 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 


That fact was so obvious that Dorothy did not 
take the trouble to answer it. 

“It’s all my fault,” said Tavia after a moment, 
her voice sounding queer and remote above the 
clamor of the storm. “I ought to have looked 
where I was going.” 

“It isn’t your fault any more than mine,” Doro¬ 
thy declared. “Anyway, nobody could look where 
she was going in this storm.” 

“Well, I suppose we might as well go on,” said 
Tavia, slapping the reins upon the pony’s sleek 
and steaming back. “If we have luck we may 
stumble on the path.” 

“Stumble is right,” said Dorothy wearily, as 
she urged her reluctant pony onward. “Oh, if I 
could only lie down somewhere,” she added, in 
a tone that she made sure would not reach Tavia. 
Then the absurdity of her wish appealed to her 
and in spite of the misery and danger of their 
predicament, she was forced to laugh at herself. 

“So many nice comfortable places around here 
to lie down in,” she told herself, sweeping a hand 
about at the sodden landscape. “Although it 
would be hard to be more wet and miserable 
than we are just now,” she added. 

They wandered on for a long time—they had 
no conception of just how long. Finally, because 
the chill was creeping into their bones and they 
felt stiff and cramped in their saddles, they dis- 


WHAT WAS THAT? 


217 

mounted and stumbled along on foot, leading their 
ponies. 

At least they would get some exercise and keep 
the blood stirring in their veins. 

Then at last relief came, or partial relief. The 
storm at last blew itself away and the sun—a 
faltering and late-afternoon sun, but the sun nev¬ 
ertheless—broke through the heavy clouds. 

Tavia was inclined to greet him with loud ex¬ 
clamations of joy, but Dorothy was too bruised 
and anxious and miserable of mind and body to 
care very much whether the sun shone or not. 

They sat down after a while on a couple of 
rocks that seemed not quite so wet as the sur¬ 
rounding country to talk things over. 

“Garry and the rest of the handsome cowboys 
must be somewhere in the neighborhood,” said 
Tavia, determined to take a cheerful view. “And 
if one of them doesn’t stumble upon us Garry is 
sure to send out a searching party as soon as he 
finds we are gone.” 

“But he won’t know we are gone till he gets 
back to the ranch, and that may be late to-night,” 
Dorothy pointed out to her, adding with a little 
moan: “What will he think of me when he finds 
what I have done!” 

“What we have done,” corrected Tavia. “Any¬ 
way, he will be far too glad to get you back again 
to scold. You can be sure of that.” 


218 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 


“And Joe! We have done a lot toward finding 
Joe!” went on Dorothy bitterly. “Those men 
could have done anything they liked to him as far 
as we are concerned. As trailers we are a bril¬ 
liant success!” 

“We haven’t set the world on fire yet,” Tavia 
admitted, as she jumped briskly to her feet. “But 
there is no use giving up the old ship so soon. 
As long as we can’t find our way out of the track¬ 
less forest we might as well make good use of our 
time and keep on hunting for Joe.” 

Dorothy stared at her chum for an instant. 
Then she also got to her feet, though stiffly and 
wearily. She was beginning to be achingly con¬ 
scious of numerous bruises she had not known she 
possessed, of sharp twinges in her back and arms 
that made her want to cry aloud with the stabbing 
pain. 

But if anything could be done, if there was the 
slightest chance of finding Joe—though this she 
doubted—she would not give up. 

“You are a confirmed optimist, Tavia honey,” 
she said. “But I’m glad you are. You make a 
mighty-much cheerfuller companion, that way.” 

“You said it!” Tavia replied, as they started 
on slowly, leading the horses. “Although I must 
confess that, internally, I am not as cheerful as 
I have sometimes been. Something whispers that 


WHAT WAS THAT? 


219 

it has been a long, long time since I gratified 
my craving for sustenance.” 

“Oh, I don’t believe I can ever eat again!” 
cried Dorothy. 

“You just wait till somebody tries you on a 
good hot plate of stew or some good hot vege¬ 
table soup,” advised Tavia sagely. “My, what 
would I give for a sniff of Mrs. Hank Ledger’s 
kitchen just now I” 

“Oh, don’t! What is the use!” cried Dorothy, 
and to Tavia’s complete surprise and dismay she 
began to cry, not violently, but softly and patheti¬ 
cally as if she could no longer check the tears. 

“Doro darling!” cried Tavia, putting an arm 
about her chum in instant sympathy and alarm. 
“What is the matter? You? Why, you never 
did this before!” 

“I know it,” replied Dorothy, dabbing at her 
eyes with a sodden handkerchief. “But I ache 
so, Tavia, and I am so frightened about Joe, and 
I wish Garry were here. Then, when you spoke 
of the ranch kitchen, it was just about the last 
straw!” 

“You might know I would go and put my foot 
in it!” cried Tavia penitently and quite at a loss 
what to do next. “You poor girl. You got hor¬ 
ribly banged up with that fall. If you weren’t the 
best sport ever you wouldn’t go on at all. But 
honestly, Doro, I don’t know what to do.” 


220 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 


“Of course you don’t,” cried Dorothy, trying 
to smile and succeeding pretty well, considering. 
“And I am a goose to act this way-” 

She stopped short, a curious expression leaping 
to her eyes. 

What was that she had heard? 

Had it been a wail—a cry for help? 

Nonsense ! In this wilderness ? 

Again it came, and this time unmistakable. 

She clung to Tavia, her face terrible to see in 
its agony of doubt, of sudden hope. 

“Some one is in trouble!” 

Tavia whispered the words as though loth to 
break the tense silence between them. 

But suddenly Dorothy broke from her, running 
wildly, blindly through the woods. 

“It’s all right, Joe darling! I’m coming! Dor¬ 
othy’s coming!” 


V 



CHAPTER XXVIII 


A VOICE IN THE MOUNTAIN 

Tavia overtook Dorothy, grasped her fiercely 
by the arm and clapped a frantic hand upon her 
mouth. 

“Hush, Doro! Are you mad?” she whispered 
fiercely. “There is something queer going on 
here. You must not let any one hear you.” 

“But it was Joe!” cried Dorothy, struggling 
frantically to be free. “Didn’t you hear? It was 
Joe’s voice! Let me go, Tavia! Let me go!” 

“Not until you can listen to reason,” cried 
Tavia, and Dorothy suddenly became quiet, star¬ 
ing at her tensely. 

“Oh, you are right—of course you are right,” 
she said, making a terrible effort to calm herself. 
“I was a little mad, I guess. Joe calling for help. 
Tavia, we must go to him quickly!” 

“Of course we must,” agreed Tavia soothingly. 
“But it won’t do us any good to rush in when 
we don’t know what we may be rushing into. 
Besides, how can you be sure that was Joe’s 
yoice?” 


221 


222 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

“Oh, Tavia, I know! Don’t you suppose I 
would know his voice anywhere?” 

Tavia nodded and scanned the mountain side 
with puzzled eyes. 

“Where do you suppose it came from?” asked 
Dorothy, her voice lowered to a whisper. She 
was beginning to tremble and her teeth chattered 
uncontrollably. “It sounded as if-” 

“It came from the side of the mountain,” Tavia 
replied. “I can’t understand it, but if we go 
cautiously we probably can solve the mystery.” 

But to “go cautiously” was the last thing Doro¬ 
thy wanted to do just then. Usually the cautious 
one, accustomed to restraining the impetuous 
Tavia, now the tables were reversed. Dorothy 
was the one who could brook no delay, Tavia the 
one who counseled caution. 

But though Dorothy’s heart urged her to fly 
to Joe, knowing that he was in peril, her head 
whispered that Tavia’s advice was sound—that 
they must proceed with infinite caution if they 
meant to help her brother. 

When Tavia said that the sound seemed to 
come from the side of the mountain she had 
meant to be taken literally. 

Through the woods and directly in front of 
them they could see the mountain where it rose 
abruptly upward. There was no trail at this point, 
for here the mountain was practically unclimbable. 



A VOICE IN THE MOUNTAIN 223 

The trail, the one they had lost, zigzagged 
tortuously this way and that seeking those sec¬ 
tions of the mountain where it was possible for 
men to force a pathway. 

“We had better tether our ponies here,” Doro¬ 
thy suggested softly. “If we take them much 
farther they are apt to whinny.” 

“Excellent idea!” said Tavia, suiting the action 
to the word. “Now, we’ll see what is funny about 
that mountain.” 

Silently they crept through the woods, careful 
to avoid twigs that might crack under their feet. 

Once when Tavia caught her toe in the gnarled 
root of a tree and fell full length upon the ground, 
she lay there for several seconds, afraid to move 
while Dorothy stood motionless, her hand touch¬ 
ing the trunk of a tree to steady herself. 

Nothing happened, no sound broke the mur¬ 
murous silence of the woods, and finally they 
gained courage to start again. 

They had gained some distance when Dorothy 
stopped, bewildered, and reached out a hand to 
Tavia. 

“It’s queer we don’t hear any further sound 
from him,” she said, her lips close to Tavia’s 
ear. “I can’t tell which way to go, can you?” 

Tavia shook her head and was about to speak 
when Dorothy raised her hand imploringly. 


224 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

She had heard another sound, and they were 
startlingly close to it. 

A man was speaking and although they could 
not hear the words they could tell by his tone 
that they were angry and threatening. And again 
the voice seemed to come from the heart of the 
mountain itself. 

“Where in the world does that voice come 
from?” whispered Tavia. “I don’t mind telling 
you, Doro, that it has me scared.” 

Dorothy held up her hand again, gesturing for 
silence. Then, before Tavia knew what she was 
up to, Dorothy flung herself face down upon the 
ground and with infinite caution made her way, 
eel-like, toward a huge rock that jutted out from 
the mountainside. 

Wondering, Tavia followed her example. 

Dorothy did not increase her speed even when 
a sharp cry rang out, shattering the silence with 
breath-taking abruptness. 

“I won’t do it—you—you—” came a boy’s 
voice, broken and furious. “You wouldn’t try 
to make me do a thing like that if you weren’t a 
lot of cowards! You wait till I tell Garry! You 
just wait!” 

“Oh, we’ll wait all right, kid.” 

The girls were near enough now to hear the 
sneering words, although the tone was still care¬ 
fully lowered. 


A VOICE IN THE MOUNTAIN 225 

The boy tried to answer, but a heavy hand 
across his mouth strangled the defiance. 

Dorothy had reached the jutting, out-flung 
rock and had solved the mystery of the mountain. 

For the rock served as a gigantic door, almost 
blocking up the entrance of a cave that seemed to 
extend far into the mountain. From where she 
and Tavia had stood when Joe’s desperate cry 
first reached their ears, the rock entirely concealed 
the entrance to the cave. 

A most excellent retreat and one admirably 
adapted to the needs of Larrimer and his gang! 

Tavia crowded close to her side and Dorothy 
saw that she also had discovered the answer to 
the riddle. 

With infinite caution Dorothy crept still closer 
to the entrance of the cave, peering around the 
edge of the rock. 

The cave was so dark that at first she could 
see nothing. 

Then, as her eyes became accustomed to the 
gloom, she made out the figure of a man squatting 
upon something that looked like an overturned 
keg or small barrel. His back was turned squarely 
to her so that she could not catch even a profile 
glimpse of his face. 

Then, her eyes searching feverishly, they fell 
upon an object that very nearly caused her to 
forget the need of caution. 


226 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 


Lying huddled upon the floor of the cave, 
pushed a little further into the darkness than the 
man’s figure, was something that appeared to be a 
bunch of old clothes. It moved, cried out in 
misery, and Dorothy knew that it was Joe. 

Every instinct in her prompted her to fly to him, 
to take him in her arms and loose the cruel bonds 
that bound him. 

She half rose to her feet. A sound that seemed 
loud to Tavia, crouching at her side, but was, in 
reality, only the shadow of a sound, escaped her 
lips. 

Tavia immediately drew her down, pressed a 
warning hand against her lips. 

“Don’t spoil it all now!” she hissed. “Lie still 
and wait.” 

Dorothy nodded mutely and peered round the 
rock again. 

Suddenly she pressed back, pushing Tavia with 
her.behind the shelter of its huge bulk. 

For the man had risen and was moving toward 
the entrance of the cave. 

“So you think you won’t, my hearty,” they 
heard him say in his heavy, jeering tone. “Well, 
I am goin’ to give you just one more chance before 
we really begin to put the screws on. This here 
little letter we want you to write, my lad, ain’t 
goin’ to hurt Garry Knapp none.” The scoundrel 


A VOICE IN THE MOUNTAIN 227 

condescended to an argumentative tone and Doro¬ 
thy clinched her hands fiercely. 

“All you have to do is to write him a letter,” 
the heavy voice went on, “tellin’ him you will be 
as free as air as soon as he agrees to sell us his 
land—at a fair figure, mind, a very fair figure. 
You would be doin’ him a favor, really. Think 
of all that cash right in his hand to-morrow, say, 
or the next day at the outside. You would be 
doin’ him a favor and savin’ your own skin at 
the same time. Come now, how about it? Let’s 
be sensible.” 

Dorothy listened breathlessly for her brother’s 
answer. She did not realize how much that an¬ 
swer meant to her till later when she found the 
imprint of her fingernails in the palms of her two 
hands. 

“Say, I can’t tell you what I think of you—I 
don’t know words that are bad enough!” cried 
Joe furiously. “But I know you’re a—a—bum— 
and I’ll get even with you for this some day.” 

“Some day—mebbe,” the man sneered. “But 
in the meantime this place ain’t goin’ to be any 
bed of roses for you, my lad. You gotta think 
of that, you know.” 

“I don’t care, as long as I play fair with Garry,” 
muttered the boy. “I—I—don’t care what— 
what you do with me.” 

But Dorothy knew that, despite all his bravado, 


228 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 


Joe was only a boy and he did care. And even 
while her heart ached with pity, it thrilled with 
pride at the thought that he had stood the test, 
had proved himself a thoroughbred. He would 
“play fair” with Garry, no matter what happened. 

She shrank back suddenly as Joe’s tormentor 
brushed the rock that guarded the entrance of 
the cave and disappeared into the woods. 

“Now, Tavia!” she whispered tensely. “Now!” 


CHAPTER XXIX 


THE DASTARDLY PLOT 

The two girls waited to make sure there was 
no one else in the cave besides Joe, listened until 
the sounds made by his captor crashing through 
the underbrush had died away. 

Then Dorothy ran to him, sank to her knees 
beside him, laughed and cried over him as she 
lifted his head and held it tight against her. 

“Joe, Joe! why did you run away? We’ve been 
nearly crazy, dear! No, no, don’t cry, Joe dar¬ 
ling! It’s all right. Your Dorothy is here. 
Nothing, nothing will ever hurt you again.” 

Her arms tightened about him fiercely and the 
boy sobbed, great, tearing sobs that he was 
ashamed of but could not control. 

The storm lasted only a minute, and then he 
said gruffly, big-boy fashion, to hide his weakness: 

“I—you oughtn’t to come near me, Dot. I— 
I’ve done an awful thing and got myself into a 
heap of trouble!” 

“Never mind about that now, dear,” cried 
Dorothy, suddenly recalled to the peril of their 
229 


230 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

situation. “We’ve got to get you away before 
that dreadful man comes back.” 

“He went off to fetch the others,” said Joe, 
growing suddenly eager and hopeful now that 
rescue seemed near. “They are going to do some¬ 
thing awful to me because I wouldn’t-” 

“Yes, yes, Joe, I know. But now be quiet,” 
cried Dorothy, as she propped him up against 
the wall and began to work feverishly at the 
knots of the heavy cord that bound his feet and 
hands. “Some one might hear you and—oh, we 
must get away from here before they come back!” 

“Here, I have something better than that,” 
cried Tavia, who had been watching Dorothy’s 
clumsy efforts to unloose Joe’s bonds. 

She fished frantically in the pockets of her 
jacket and brought forth a rather grimy ball of 
cord and a penknife. This she held up triumph¬ 
antly. 

“A good sight better than your fingers!” 

“Oh, give it to me, quickly,” cried Dorothy, 
reaching for the knife in an agony of apprehen¬ 
sion. “Oh, it won’t open! Yes, I have it!” 

With the sharp blade she sawed feverishly at 
the cords. 

They gave way one after another and she 
flung them on to the floor of the cave. 

Joe tried to get to his feet, but stumbled and 
fell. 



THE DASTARDLY PLOT 


231 

“Feel funny and numb, kind of,” he muttered. 
‘‘Been tied up too long, I guess.” 

“But, Joe, you must stand up—you must!” 
cried Dorothy frantically. “Come, try again. 
I’ll hold you. You must try, Joe. They will be 
back in a minute! Never mind how much it hurts, 
stand up!” 

With Dorothy’s aid Joe got to his feet again 
slowly and painfully and stood there, swaying, an 
arm about his sister’s shoulders, the other hand 
clenched tight against the damp, rocky wall of the 
cave. 

The pain was so intense as the blood flowed 
back into his tortured feet that his face went white 
and he clenched his teeth to keep from crying out. 

“Do you think you can walk at all, dear?” 
asked Dorothy, her own face white with the 
reflection of his misery. “If you could manage to 
walk a little way! We have horses in the woods 
and it would be harder for them to find us there. 
Try, Joe dear! Try!” 

“I guess I can make it now, Sis,” said Joe 
from between his clenched teeth. “If Tavia will 
help a little too—on the other side.” 

“I guess so!” cried Tavia with alacrity, as she 
put Joe’s other arm about her shoulders and gave 
his hand a reassuring squeeze. “Now something 
tells me that the sooner we leave this place behind 
the healthier it will be for all of us.” 


232 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

“Hush! What’s that?” cried Dorothy, and 
they stood motionless for a moment, listening. 

“I didn’t hear anything, Doro,” whispered 
Tavia. “It was just nerves, I guess.” 

They took a step toward the entrance of the 
cave, Joe still leaning heavily upon the two 
girls. 

A horse whinnied sharply and as they paused 
again, startled, a sinister shadow fell across the 
narrow entrance to the cave. They shrank back 
as substance followed shadow and a man wedged 
his way into the cave. 

He straightened up and winked his eyes at the 
unexpected sight that met them. 

Dorothy stifled a startled exclamation as she 
recognized him. It was the small, black-eyed 
man, Gibbons, known to Desert City as George 
Lightly, who stood blinking at them. 

Suddenly he laughed, a short, sharp laugh, and 
turned back toward the mouth of the cave. 

“Come on in, fellows!” he called cautiously. 
“Just see what I found!” 

Joe’s face, through the grime and dirt that 
covered it, had grown fiery red and he struggled 
to get free of Dorothy and Tavia. 

“Just you let me get my hands on him!” he 
muttered. “I’ll show him! “I’ll-” 

“You keep out of this, Joe,” Dorothy whispered 
fiercely. “Let me do the talking.” 



THE DASTARDLY PLOT 


233 


Three other men squeezed through the narrow 
opening and stood blinking in the semi-darkness 
of the cave. 

One of them Dorothy recognized as Joe’s for¬ 
mer captor, a big, burly man with shifty eyes and 
a loose-lipped mouth, another was Philo Marsh, 
more smug and self-sufficient than she remem¬ 
bered him, and the third was Cal Stiffbold, her 
handsome cavalier of the train ride, who had 
called himself Stanley Blake. 

It took the girls, crouched against the wall of 
the cave, only a moment to see all this, and the 
men were no slower in reading the meaning of 
the situation. 

Stiffbold’s face was suffused with fury as he 
recognized Dorothy and Tavia, and he took a 
threatening step forward. Philo Marsh reached 
out a hand and drew him back, saying in mild 
tones: 

“Easy there, Stiffbold. Don’t do anything you 
are likely to regret.” 

“So, ladies to the rescue, eh?” sneered Lightly, 
thrusting his hands into his pockets and regarding 
the girls with an insulting leer. “Regular little 
heroines and all, ain’t you? Well, now, I’ll be 
blowed!” 

“Young ladies, this isn’t the place for you, you 
know.” Philo Marsh took a step forward, reach¬ 
ing out his hand toward Joe. “You’re interfering, 


234 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

you know, and you’re likely to get yourselves in 
a heap o’ trouble. But if you’ll go away and stay 
away and keep your mouths closed-” 

“And leave my brother here with you scoun¬ 
drels, I suppose?” suggested Dorothy. 

The hypocritical expression upon the face of 
Philo Marsh changed suddenly to fury at her 
short, scornful laugh. 

“Scoundrels, is it?” he sneered. “Well, my 
young lady, maybe you’ll know better than to 
call honest people names before you leave this 
place.” 

“Honest people! You?” cried Dorothy, no 
longer able to contain her furious indignation. 
“That sounds startling coming from you, Philo 
Marsh, and your—honest friends! 

“Do you call it honest,” she took a step for¬ 
ward and the men retreated momentarily, abashed 
before her fury, “to take a poor boy away from 
his people, to hide him here in a place like this, to 
torture him physically and mentally, to attempt 
to make him false to all his standards of 
right-” 

“See here, this won’t do!” Lightly blustered, 
but Dorothy turned upon him like a tigress. 

“You will listen to me till I have said what I 
am going to say,” she flung at him. “You do all 
this—you honest men,” she turned to the others, 
searing them with her scorn. “And why? So 




THE DASTARDLY PLOT 


235 


that you can force Garry Knapp, who has the 
best farmlands anywhere around here—and who 
will make more than good some day, in spite of 
you, yes, in spite of you, I say—to turn over his 
lands to you for a song, an amount of money that 
would hardly pay him for the loss of one little 
corner of it-” 

“Say, are we goin’ to stand here and take this?” 

“Yes, you are—Stanley Blake!” Dorothy 
flamed at him, and the man retreated before her 
fury. “And then, when this boy defies you, what 
do you do? Act like honest men? Of course you 
do! You threaten to ‘put the screws on’ until 
he is too weak to defy you, a boy against four— 
honest—men! If that is honesty, if that is 
bravery, then I would rather be like that slimy 
toad out in the woods who knows nothing of such 
things!” 

“Hold on there, you!” George Lightly started 
forward, his hand uplifted threateningly. “You 
call us any more of those pretty names and 
I’ll-” 

“What will you do?” Dorothy defied him 
gloriously, her eyes blazing. “You dare to lay a 
hand upon me or my friend or my brother,” 
instinctively her arm tightened about Joe, “and 
Garry Knapp will hound you to the ends of the 
earth. Hark! What’s that?” She paused, head 
uplifted, listening. 




236 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

They all listened in a breathless silence while 
the distant clatter of horses’ hoofs breaking a way, 
through the woodland came closer—ever closer! 

“Garry!” Dorothy lifted her head and sent 
her cry ringing through the woodland. “We are 
over this way, Garry, over this way! Come 
qui-” 




A HORSEMAN BROKE THROUGH THE UNDERBRUSH. IT WAS GARRY. 
“Dorothy Dale to the Rescue.” Page 237 














CHAPTER XXX 


CAPTURED 

A ROUGH hand closed over Dorothy’s mouth, 
shutting off her breath, strangling her. In an 
instant Tavia and Joe were similarly gagged and 
helpless. 

There was a silence during which their captors 
waited breathlessly, hoping that the horseman 
had not heard the cry, would pass the cave by. 

For a moment, remembering how well the spot 
was concealed, Dorothy was horribly afraid that 
this might actually happen. If it was really Garry 
coming! If he had heard her! 

But the clattering hoofs still came on. She 
could hear the shouts of the riders, Garry’s voice, 
calling her name! 

She felt herself released with a suddenness and 
violence that sent her reeling toward the rear of 
the cave. The men were making for the entrance, 
jostling one another and snarling in their efforts 
to escape. 

The men out of sight beyond the huge rock, 
Dorothy and Tavia rushed to the cave mouth, 
leaving poor Joe to limp painfully after them, 
237 


238 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

just in time to see the knaves disappear among 
the trees. 

The next moment a horseman broke through 
the underbrush, charging straight for them. It 
was Garry I 

At sight of Dorothy he pulled his horse to its 
haunches, drawing in his breath in a sharp excla¬ 
mation. 

“Dorothy! Thank heaven! I thought-” 

“Never mind about us, Garry. They went over 
that way—the men you are after!” 

She pointed in the direction the men had dis¬ 
appeared and Garry nodded. The next moment 
he had spurred his pony in pursuit, followed by 
several other horsemen who had come up behind 
him. 

The girls watched them go, and Joe, coming up 
behind them, laid a dirty hand upon his sister’s 
shoulder. 

“You—you were great, Sis, to those men!” he 
said awkwardly. “I was awfully proud of you.” 

Dorothy smiled through tears and, taking Joe’s 
grimy hand, pressed it against her cheek. 

“It is so wonderful to have you again, dear!” 
she said huskily. 

They were back again in a moment, Garry and 
his men, bringing with Ahem two captives—the 
big-framed, loose-lipped fellow who had first 
taunted Joe in the cave, and George Lightly. 



CAPTURED 


239 

By Garry’s face it was easy to see he was in 
no mood to deal gently with his prisoners. 

He dismounted, threw the bridle to one of the 
men, and approached the big fellow whom he 
knew to be a tool of the Larrimer gang. 

The fellow was sullen and glowering, but Garry 
was a good enough judge to guess that beneath 
this exterior the fellow was ready to break. 

“Now then,” Garry said coolly, as he pressed 
the muzzle of his revolver in uncomfortable prox¬ 
imity to the ribs of his prisoner, “you tell us what 
you were doing in that cave over there and you’ll 
go scot free. Otherwise, it’s jail for you—if not 
worse. My men,” he added, in a gentle drawl, 
“are just hankering to take part in a lynching 
party. It’s a right smart time since they have 
been treated to that sort of entertainment, and 
they are just ripe for a little excitement. How 
about it, boys, am I right?” 

There came an ominous murmur from the 
“boys” that caused the prisoner to look up at them 
quickly and then down again at his shuffling feet. 

Lightly tried to interfere, but Garry silenced 
him sharply. 

“You hankering to be in this lynching party, 
too?” he inquired, adding gratingly: “Because if 
you are not, I’d advise you to keep your mouth 
tight shut!” 

It was not long before the captive yielded to 


240 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

the insistence of that revolver muzzle pressed be¬ 
neath his fifth rib and made a clean breast of the 
whole ugly business. Possibly the invitation to 
the lynching party had something to do with 
his surrender. 

As he stutteringly and sullenly revealed the plot 
which would have forced Garry to the sale of 
his lands to insure the safety of his fiancee’s 
brother, Garry jotted down the complete confes¬ 
sion in his notebook and at the conclusion forced 
both his prisoners at the point of his revolver to 
sign the document. 

Then Garry turned to two of the cowboys, who 
had been looking on with appreciative grins. 

“Here, Steve, and you, Gay, take these two 
worms to town and see that they are put where 
they belong,” he ordered, and the two boys leaped 
to the task eagerly. “You others go help the 
boys round up the rest of the gentlemen mentioned 
in this valuable document,” and he tapped the 
confession with a cheerful grin. “So long, you 
fellows!” 

They waved their hats at him, wheeled their 
ponies joyfully, and were off to do his bidding. 

Then it was that Garry came toward Dorothy, 
his arms outstretched. It is doubtful if at that 
moment he even saw Joe and Tavia standing 
there. 

Dorothy took a step toward him and suddenly 


CAPTURED 


241 


the whole world seemed to rock and whirl about 
her. She flung out her hand and grasped nothing 
but air. Then down, down into fathomless space 
and nothingness! 

Dorothy opened her eyes again to find herself 
in a bed whose softness and cleanliness meant 
untold luxury to her. Her body ached all over, 
horribly, and her head ached too. 

She closed her eyes, but there was a movement 
beside the bed that made her open them again 
swiftly. Somebody had coughed, and it had 
sounded like Joe. 

She turned over slowly, discovering new aches 
and pains as she did so, and saw that it was indeed 
Joe sitting there, his eyes fixed hungrily upon her. 

She opened her arms and he ran to her and 
knelt beside the bed. 

“Aw, now, don’t go to crying, Sis,” he said, 
patting her shoulder awkwardly. “They said if 
I bothered you they wouldn’t let me stay.” 

“I’d like to see them get you away,” cried 
Dorothy. “Joe, sit back a little bit and let me 
look at you. I can’t believe it’s you 1” 

“But I did an awful thing, Dot,” he said, hang¬ 
ing his head. “You’d better let me tell you about 
it before you get too glad I’m back.” 

“Tell me about it then, dear,” said Dorothy 


242 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

quietly. “I’ve been wanting to know just why 
you ran away.” 

“It was all because of the fire at Haskell’s toy 
store,” said Joe, speaking swiftly, as though he 
would be glad to get the explanation over. “Jack 
Popella said the explosion was all my fault and 
he told me I would be put in prison-” 

“But just what did you do?” Dorothy insisted. 

“Well, it was like this.” Joe took a long 
breath, glanced up at her, then turned his eyes 
away again. “Jack had a fight with Mr. Haskell 
over some money he picked up in the road. Mr. 
Haskell said he stole it from his cash drawer, but 
Jack kept on saying he found it in the road. I 
shouldn’t wonder if he did steal it though, at 
that,” Joe went on, thoughtfully, and for the first 
time Dorothy looked at him accusingly. 

“You know I begged you not to have anything 
to do with Jack Popella, Joe.” 

The lad hung his head and flushed scarlet. 

“I know you did. I won’t ever, any more.” 

“All right, dear. Tell me what happened then.” 

“Jack was so mad at Mr. Haskell he said he 
would like to knock down all the boxes in the 
room back of his store just to get even. He asked 
me to help him and—just for fun—I said sure I 
would. Then he told me to go on in and get 
started and he would come in a minute. 

“I knocked down a couple of boxes,” Joe con- 



CAPTURED 


243 


tinued, after a strained silence. “And then—the 
explosion came. Jack said I was to blame and 
—the—the cops were after me. I wasn’t going 
to let them send me to prison,” he lifted his head 
with a sort of bravado and met Dorothy’s gaze 
steadily. “So—so I came out West to Garry.” 

“And you are going back again with me, Joe,” 
said his sister firmly. “It was cowardly to run 
away. Now you will have to face the music!” 

Joe hung his head for a moment, then squared 
his shoulders and looked bravely at Dorothy. 

“All right, Dot. I guess it was kind of sneak¬ 
ing to run away. I—I’m awful sorry.” 

The door opened softly behind them and Tavia 
poked her head in. 

“My goodness gracious, Doro Doodlekins,” 
she cried, “you look as bright as a button. First 
thing you know I’ll be minus a patient.” 

Dorothy propped herself up on her elbow and 
stared at her chum. 

“Tavia, we must send a telegram immediately,” 
she cried. “The Major must know that Joe is 
safe.” 

Tavia came over and smoothed her pillow 
fondly. 

“Foolish child, did you think no one but you 
would think of that?” she chided. “Garry sent 
one of the boys to Dugonne with orders to send 
a night letter to The Cedars telling everything 


244 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

that happened. That was after you fainted, you 
know, and we brought you here.” 

“Such a foolish thing to do,” sighed Dorothy, 
sinking back on her pillow. “What must Garry 
think of me?” 

“Suppose I let him answer that for himself,” 
suggested the flyaway, and before Dorothy could 
protest she had seized Joe by the arm and escorted 
him gently from the room. A moment later 
Dorothy could hear Tavia calling to Garry that 
he was “needed very much upstairs.” 

Dorothy closed her eyes and opened them the 
next minute to find Garry standing beside the bed, 
looking down at her. She reached out a hand to 
him and he took it very gently, kneeling down 
beside her. 

“Joe and Tavia have been telling me how you 
stood up to those men in the cave, little girl. I 
only wish I had been there to see you do it. We’ve 
got them all, by the way, and Stiffbold and Lightly 
and the rest of them are where they won’t hatch 
any more schemes in a hurry—thanks to you.” 

“Thanks to me?” repeated Dorothy, wonder¬ 
ing. “Garry, why?” 

“I never would have discovered that cave if 
I hadn’t heard you call out,” Garry explained. 
“That hole in the mountainside was the coziest 
little retreat I ever saw.” 

“Well, I’m glad if I helped a little,” sighed 


CAPTURED 245 

Dorothy. “I was afraid you might be going to 
scold me.” 

“Scold you?” repeated Garry tenderly. “You 
foolish, little brick!” 

It was a long time before Garry remembered 
something that had once seemed important to 
him. With an exclamation of dismay he stuck his 
hand in his pocket and drew forth a yellow en¬ 
velope. 

“Here’s a telegram from The Cedars, and I 
clean forgot all about it,” he said penitently. 
“One of the boys brought it from Dugonne where 
he went to send the telegram to Major Dale. I 
didn’t mean to keep it, honest I didn’t!” 

“Under the circumstances, I don’t blame you in 
the least,” said Dorothy demurely, as she hastily 
tore open the telegram. 

She read it through, then turned to Garry with 
shining eyes. 

“This is the one thing I needed to make me 
perfectly happy, Garry,” she said. “Nat says 
that Jack Popella has been arrested for setting 
Haskell’s store on fire. That automatically clears 
Joe of suspicion!” 

“That’s great. The poor kid has had more 
than his share of worry lately. Just wait till he 
reads that telegram.” And to Tavia, passing the 
door at that moment, he gave the yellow sheet 


246 DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

with the request that she convey it to Joe with all 
possible speed. 

“Just to be comfortable and safe and happy 
once more,” murmured Dorothy, as Garry came 
back to her. “It seems very wonderful, Garry.” 

“And my job,” said Garry softly, “will be to 
keep you safe and comfortable and happy for the 
rest of your life!” 




THE DOROTHY PALE SERIES 


By MARGARET PENROSE 

Author of “The Motor Girls Series,” “Radio Girls Series,” &c. 
12 wo. Illustrated 

Price per volume, $1.00, postpaid 


Dorothy Dale is the daughter of an old Civil 
War veteran who is running a weekly news¬ 
paper in a small Eastern town. Her sunny 
disposition, her fun-loving ways and her trials 
and triumphs make clean, interesting and fas¬ 
cinating reading. The Dorothy Dale Series is 
one of the most popular series of hooks for girls 
ever published. 

DOROTHY DALE: A GIRL OF TO-DAY 
DOROTHY DALE AT GLENWOOD SCHOOL 
DOROTHY DALE'S GREAT SECRET 
DOROTHY DALE AND HER CHUMS 
DOROTHY DALE'S QUEER HOLIDAYS 
DOROTHY DALE'S CAMPING DAYS 
DOROTHY DALE'S SCHOOL RIVALS 
DOROTHY DALE IH THE CITY 
DOROTHY DALE'S PROMISE 
DOROTHY DALE IN THE WEST 
DOROTHY DALE'S STRANGE DISCOVERY 
DOROTHY DALE'S ENGAGEMENT 
DOROTHY DALE TO THE RESCUE 

Send For Our Free Illustrated Catalogue 



CUPPLES & LEON COMPANY, Publishers 


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The Motor Girls Series 

By MARGARET PENROSE 

r Author of the highly successful “Dorothy Dale Series'* 

12mo. Illustrated. Price per volume, $1.00 postpaid. 



Since the enormous success of our “Motor 
Boys Series,” by Clarence Young, we have 
been asked to get out a similar series for 
girls. No one Is better equipped to furnish 
these tales than Mrs. Penrose, who, besides 
being an able writer, is an expert auto* 
mobilist. 

The Motor girls 

or A Mystery of the Road 

The motor Girls on a Tour 

or Keeping a Strange Promise 

The Motor Girls at Lookout beach 

or In Quest of the Runaways 

The Motor Girls Through new England 

or Held by the Gypsies 

The Motor Girls on Cedar lake 

or The Hermit of Fern Island 

The Motor Girls on the Coast 

or The Waif from the Sea 

The Motor Girls on crystal bay 

or The Secret of the Red Oar 

The Motor Girls on Waters blue 

or The Strange Cruise of the Tartar 

The Motor Girls at Camp Surprise 

or The Cave in the Mountain 

The Motor Girls in the mountains 

or The Gypsy Girl's Secret 


CUPPLES & LEON CO., Publishers, 


NEW YORK 












THE LINGER-NOT SERIES 


By aqnes miller 

12 mo. Cloth. Illustrated. Jacket in full colors 

Price per volume, 65 cents, postpaid 



This new series of girls ’ books is in a nem 
style of story writing. The interest is in knowing 
the girls and seeing them solve the problems 
that develop their character. Incidentally , a 
great deal of historical information is imparted , 
and a fine atmosphere of responsibility is made 
pleasing and useful to the reader. 


1. THE LSNGER-NOTS AND THE MYSTERY HOUSE 

or The Story of Nine Adventurous Girls 

How the Linger-Not girls met and formed their club seems com¬ 
monplace, but this writer makes it fascinating, and how they made 
their club serve a great purpose continues the interest to the end, and 
introduces a new type of girlhood. 


2. THE LBNGER-NOTS AND THE VALLEY FEUD 

or The Great West Point Chain 

The Linger-Not girls had no thought of becoming mixed up with 
feuds or mysteries, but their habit of being useful soon entangled 
them in some surprising adventures that turned out happily for all, 
and made the valley better because of their visit. 


3. THE LINGER-NOTS AND THEIR GOLDEN QUEST 

or The Log of the Ocean Monarch 

For a club of girls to become involved in a mystery leading back 
into the times of the California gold-rush, seems unnatural until the 
reader sees how it happened, and how the girls helped one of their 
friends to come into her rightful name and inheritance, forms a fine 
story. 

Send For Our Free Illustrated Catalogue 


CUPPLE5 & LEON COMPANY, Publishers 


New York 















THE RADIO GIRLS SERIES 


By MARGARET PENROSE 

12 mo. Cloth. Illustrated. Jacket in full colors 

Price per volume, 65 cents, postpaid 

A new and up-to-date series , taking in the 
activities of several bright girls who become 
interested in radio. The stories tell of thrilling 
exploits, out-door life and the great part the 
Radio plays in the adventures of the girls and 
in solving their mysteries. Fascinating books 
that girls of all ages will want to read. 

1. THE RADIO GIRLS OF ROSELAWN 

or A Strange Message from the Air 
Showing how. Jessie Norwood, and her 
chums became interested in radiophoning, 
how they gave a concert for a worthy local 
charity, and how they received a sudden and 
unexpected call for help out of the air. A girl wanted as witness in a 
celebrated law case disappears, and the radio girls go to the rescue, 

2. THE RADIO GIRLS ON THE PROGRAM 

or Singing and Reciting at the Sending Station 
When listening in on a thrilling recitation or a superb concert 
number who of us has not longed to “look behind the scenes” to see 
how it was done? The girls had made the acquaintance of a sending 
station manager and in this volume are permitted to get on the pro¬ 
gram, much to their delight. A tale full of action and fun. 

3. THE RADIO GIRLS ON STATION ISLAND 

or The Wireless from the Steam Yacht 
In this volume the girls travel to the seashore and put in a-vacation 
on an island where is located a big radio sending station. The big 
brother of one of the girls owns a steam yacht ana while out with a 
pleasure party those on the island receive word by radio that the 
yacht is on fire. A tale thrilling to the last page. 

4. THE RADIO GIRLS AT FOREST LODGE 

or The Strange Hut in the Swamp 
The Radio Girls spend several weeks on the shores of a beautiful 
lake and with their radio get news of a great forest fire. It also aids 
them in rounding up some undesirable folks who occupy the strange 
hut in the swamp. 

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TOE BETTY GORDON SERIES 

By ALICE B. EMERSON 

Author of the Famous f, Ruth Fielding*’ Series 

'Vino. Cloth. Illustrated. Jacket in full colors 

Price per volume, 65 cents, postpaid 


A series of stories by Alice B. Emerson which 
are bound to make this writer more popular 
than ever with her host of girl readers. 

1. BETTY GORDON AT BRAMBLE 
FARM 

or The Mystery of a Nobody 
At the age of twelve Betty is left an orphan. 

2- BETTY GORDON IN WASHINGTON 

or Strange Adventures in a Great City 
In this volume Betty goes to the National Capitol to find her 
; uncle and has several unusual adventures. 

3. BETTY GORDON IN THE LAND OF OIL 

or The Farm That Was Worth a Fortune 
From Washington the scene is shifted to the great oil fields of 
our country. A splendid picture of the oil field operations of today. 

4. BETTY GORDON AT BOARDING SCHOOL 

or The Treasure of Indian Chasm 
Seeking the treasure of Indian Chasm makes an exceedingly inter¬ 
esting incident. 

5. BETTY GORDON AT MOUNTAIN CAMP 

or The Mystery of Ida Bellethorne 
At Mountain Camp Betty found herself in the midst of a mystery 
involving a girl whom she had previously met in Washington. 

6. BETTY GORDON AT OCEAN PARK 

or School Chums on the Boardwalk 
A glorious outing that Betty and her chums never forgot. 

7. BETTY GORDON AND HER SCHOOL CHUMS 

or Bringing the Rebels to Terms 

Rebellious students, disliked teachers and mysterious robberies 
make a fascinating story. 

V. 

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.BETOfOgBON 



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THE RUTH FIELDING SERIES 


3y ALICE 3. EMERSON 

12 mo • Illustrated . Price per volume, 65 cents, postpaid 

Ruth Fielding will live in juvenile Fiction . 

RUTH FOLDING OF THE RED MILL 

or Jasper Parloe's Secret 

RUTH FI ELDING AT BRIAR WOOD HALL 

or Solving the Campus Mystery 

RUTH FIELDING AT SNOW CAMP 

or Lost in the Backwoods 

RUTH FOLDING AT LIGHTHOUSE 
POINT or Nita, the Girl Castaway 

RUTH FIELDING AT SILVER RANCH 
or Schoolgirls Among the Cowboys 

RUTH FIELDING ON^CLIFF ISLAND 
or The Old Hunter's Treasure Box 

RUTH FIELDING AT SUNRISE FARSV3 

or What Became of the Raby Orphans 

RUTH FIELDING AND THE GYPSIES 
or The Missing Pearl Necklace 
RUTH FIELDING IN MOVING PICTURES 
or Helping the Dormitory Fund 
RUTH FIELDING DOWN IN DIXIE 
' or Great Days in the Land of Cotton 
RUTH FIELDING AT COLLEGE 

or The Mis sing Examination Papers 
RUTH FIELDING IN THE SADDLE 
or College Girls in the Land of Gold 
RUTH FIELDING IN THE RED CROSS 
or Doing Her Bit for Uncle Sam 
RUTH FIELDING AT THE WAR FRONT 
or The Hunt for a Lost Soldier 
RUTH FIELDING HOMEWARD BOUND 
or A Red Cross Worker’s Ocean Perils 
RUTH FIELDING DOWN EAST 

or The Hermit of Beach Plum Point 
RUTH FIELDING IN THE GREAT NORTHWEST 
or The Indian Girl Star of the Movies 
RUTH FIELDING ON THE ST. LAWRENCE 
or The Queer Old Man of the Thousand Islands 
RUTH FIELDING TREASURE HUNTING 
or A Moving Picture that Became Real 


New York 



jgjjfeggWto-jJi ^ 

§ 

RUTH FIHJMNG 
RED MILL 


iiy 

1 

J«I »■ W?WCW_ 


CUPPLES & LEON COMPANY, Publishers 





































































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